Had not Father often laughed mockingly at me because of it ? It was three weeks since Father had died -- my proud , handsome , unrelenting old father , whom I had loved so intensely and who had never loved me . I had always accepted this fact unresentfully and unquestioningly , but it had steeped my whole life in its tincture of bitterness . Father had never forgiven me for two things . I had cost my mother 's life and I was not a son to perpetuate the old name and carry on the family feud with the Frasers . I was a very lonely child , with no playmates or companions of any sort , and my girlhood was lonelier still . The only passion in my life was my love for my father . I would have done and suffered anything to win his affection in return . But all I ever did win was an amused tolerance -- and I was grateful for that -- almost content . It was much to have something to love and be permitted to love it . If I had been a beautiful and spirited girl I think Father might have loved me , but I was neither . At first I did not think or care about my lack of beauty ; then one day I was alone in the beech wood ; I was trying to disentangle my skirt which had caught on some thorny underbrush . A young man came around the curve of the path and , seeing my predicament , bent with murmured apology to help me . He had to kneel to do it , and I saw a ray of sunshine falling through the beeches above us strike like a lance of light athwart the thick brown hair that pushed out from under his cap . Before I thought I put out my hand and touched it softly , then I blushed crimson with shame over what I had done . But he did not know -- he never knew . When he had released my dress he rose and our eyes met for a moment as I timidly thanked him . I saw that he was good to look upon -- tall and straight , with broad , stalwart shoulders and a dark , clean-cut face . He had a firm , sensitive mouth and kindly , pleasant , dark blue eyes . I never quite forgot the look in those eyes .
It made my heart beat strangely , but it was only XXXXX a moment , and the next he had lifted his cap and passed on .
If about around as for in of on since that