Part 78 (1/2)

It was good to be sitting there together by a fireside. So good indeed that it swept everything away that had stood between them, with swift, generous sweeping. There had been nothing real in the barrier, scarcely anything that needed explaining, only the foolish imaginings of two hearts that had become imbued with wrong impressions.

”I thought I loved Doris,” he told her, still caressing her hand; ”but afterwards it was like a pale fancy to my love for you.”

”I was terrified lest she should wreck both your lives,” She answered.

”She cared so much for money, and the things money can buy. Without it, she might have grown bitter and hard and reckless. With it, she wil grow kinder, I think. She felt Basil's death very much. She shed the most genuine tears she has ever shed in her life. Dudley, if Basil had known that this was coming, it would have been a great comfort to him.”

”He did know.”

”He knew!...” in surprise. ”How could he?”

”I told him. I saw he was fretting very much about you, and I guessed what was in his mind. I told him I loved you better than my life; and he said: ”Thank G.o.d, it will all come right some day.”

”Ah, I am glad that he knew. Dear Basil, dear Basil. If he had been less splendid, Dudley, I think I should have taken my own life when he died and left me alone. But in the face of courage like his, one could not be a coward.”

Later Dudley took her home. At the door he asked her pleadingly:

”May I came in for a moment? I want to see the flat as it looks now.”

She led the way, and they stood together in the little sitting-room where Basil had lived and died, and where Dudley's flowers now shed a fragrance of welcome.

She buried her face in the delicate petals, with memories, and thoughts, and feelings too deep for words.

”It feels almost as if his spirit were here with us now,” he said softly. ”He was so sure he was only going to a grander and wider life.

I think he must have been right; and that to-night he _knows_.”

Tears were in her eyes again. The loss was so recent still - the memory so painful. He drew her to him, and kissed them away.

”That night, Ethel, that first, terrible night when you were alone, it nearly killed me to have to go away and leave you, to feel I could not do anything at all. You must let me comfort you doubly now to make up for it. You must come to me quickly.” She smiled softly, and he added: ”It would have been Basil's wish, too. He hated the office as much as I do. Tell them to-morrow that you're not coming any more.”

Her smile deepened at his boyishness.

”There are certain hard-and-fast rules to be observed about leaving.

I'm afraid they won't waive them for you.”

”Well, tell them you are going to be married... You _are_ going to be married, aren't you?...” for a moment he was almost like Hal. ”Well, why don't you answer? I want to know.”

”I haven't made up my mind sufficiently yet,” with a low, happy laugh.

”Then I must make it up for you.”

His manner changed again to one of wondering, absorbing tenderness.

Hal had been right, as usual. Under the man's surface-narrowness and superiority was a deep, true heart that had only been waiting the hour of its great emanc.i.p.ation. He took her in his arms and kissed her again and again.

”Child,” he breathed, ”haven't I waited long enough? Every hour of the last few months, since I knew, has been like a year. Don't make me leave you here alone one moment longer than is necessary.”

So it happened that when Hal came back to a dreary, empty, joyless London, an unexpected gladness was waiting for her.

The last few days had almost broken her spirit. The pathos of that lonely, far-off grave, in the little alien churchyard, where they tenderly left the remains of the beautiful, brilliant woman who had been so much in her life for so long, seemed more than she could bear.