Part 37 (2/2)

Restlessly she wandered up and down, up and down. It was a day for dreams, but she was terribly and tragically awake.

When Nap Errol came to her at length with his quick, light tread that was wary and noiseless as a cat's, she knew of his coming long before he reached her, was vividly, painfully aware of him before she turned to look. Yesterday she had longed to look him in the face, but to-day she felt she dared not.

Slim and active he moved across the gra.s.s, and there came to her ears a slight jingle of spurs. He had ridden then. A sudden memory of the man's free insolence in the saddle swept over her, his domination, his imperial arrogance. Turning to meet him, she knew that she was quivering from head to foot.

He came straight up to her, halted before her. ”Have you no welcome for me?” he said.

By sheer physical effort she compelled herself to face him, to meet the fierce, challenging scrutiny which she knew awaited her. She held out her hand to him. ”I am always glad to see you, Nap,” she said.

He took her hand in a sinewy, compelling grip. ”Although you prefer good men,” he said.

The ground on which she stood seemed to be shaking, yet she forced herself to smile, ignoring his words.

”Let us go and sit down,” she said.

Close by was a seat under a great lilac tree in full purple bloom. She moved to it and sat down, but Nap remained upon his feet, watching her still.

The air was laden with perfume--the wonderful indescribable essences of spring. Away in the distance, faintly heard, arose the bleating of lambs.

Near at hand, throned among the purple flowers above their heads, a thrush was pouring out the rapture that thrilled his tiny life. The whole world pulsed to the one great melody--the universal, wordless song. Only the man and the woman were silent as intruders in a sacred place.

Anne moved at last. She looked up very steadily, and spoke. ”It seems like holy ground,” she said.

Her voice was hushed, yet it had in it a note of pleading. Her eyes besought him.

And in answer Nap leaned down with a sudden, tigerish movement and laid his hand on hers. ”What have I to do with holiness?” he said. ”Anne, come down from that high pedestal of yours! I'm tired of wors.h.i.+pping a G.o.ddess. I want a woman--a woman! I shall wors.h.i.+p you none the less because I hold you in my arms.”

It was done. The spell was broken. Those quick, pa.s.sionate words had swept away her last hope of escape. She was forced to meet him face to face, to meet him and to do battle.

For a long second she sat quite still, almost as if stunned. Then sharply she turned her face aside, as one turns from the unbearable heat and radiance when the door of a blast-furnace is suddenly opened.

”Oh, Nap,” she said, and there was a sound of heart-break in her words, ”What a pity! What a pity!”

”Why?” he demanded fiercely. ”I have the right to speak--to claim my own.

Are you going to deny it--you who always speak the truth?”

”You have no right,” she answered, still with her face averted. ”No man has ever the faintest right to say to another man's wife what you have just said to me.”

”And you think I will give you up,” he said, ”for that?”

She did not at once reply. Only after a moment she freed her hands from his hold, and the action seemed to give her strength. She spoke, her voice very clear and resolute. ”I am not going to say anything unkind to you. You have already borne too much for my sake. But--you must know that this is the end of everything. It is the dividing of the ways--where we must say good-bye.”

”Is it?” he said. He looked down at her with his brief, thin-lipped smile. ”Then--if that's so--look at me--look at me, Anne, and tell me that you don't love me!”

She made an almost convulsive gesture of protest and sat silent.

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