Part 18 (1/2)
His voice lingered on it as though it were a delightful remembrance.
She found herself holding one of her hands in the other. She could feel the pressure of Transley's ring on her palm, and she held it tighter still.
”Riding anywhere in particular?” he inquired.
”No. Just mooning.” She looked up at him again, this time at close quarters. It was a quick, bright flash on his face--a moment only.
”Why mooning?”
She did not answer. Looking down in the water he met her gaze there.
”You're troubled!” he exclaimed.
”Oh, no! My--my ankle hurts a little.”
He looked at her sympathetically. ”But not that much,” he said.
She gave a forced little laugh. ”What a mind reader you are! Can you tell my fortune?”
”I should have to read it in your hand.”
She would have extended her hand, but for Transley's ring.
”No.... No. You'll have to read it in--in the stars.”
”Then look at me.” She did so, innocently.
”I cannot read it there,” he said, after his long gaze had begun to whip the color to her cheeks. ”There is no answer.”
She turned again to the water, and after a long while she heard his voice, very low and earnest.
”Zen, I could read a fortune for you, if you would not be offended. We are only chance acquaintances--not very well acquainted, yet--”
She knew what he meant, but she pretended she did not. Even in that moment something came to her of Transley's speech about love being a game of pretence. Very well, she would play the game--this once.
”I don't see how I could be offended at your reading my fortune,” she murmured.
”Then this is the fortune I would read for you,” he said boldly. ”I see a young man, a rather foolish young man, perhaps, by ordinary standards, and yet one who has found a great deal of happiness in his simple, unconventional life. Until a short time ago he felt that life could give him all the happiness that was worth having. He had health, strength, hours of work and hours of pleasure, the fields, the hills, the mountains, the sky--all G.o.d's open places to live in and enjoy. He thought there was nothing more.
”Well, then he found, all of a sudden, that there was something more--everything more. He made that discovery on a calm autumn night, when fire had blackened all the foothills and still ran in dancing red ribbons over their distant crests. That night a great thing--two great things--came into his life. First was something he gave. Not very much, indeed, but typical of all it might be. It was service. And next was something he received, something so wonderful he did not understand it then, and does not understand it yet. It was trust. These were things he had been leaving largely out of his life, and suddenly he discovered how empty it was. I think there is one word for both these things, and, it may be, for even more. You know?”
”I know,” she said, and her voice was scarcely audible.
”But it is YOUR fortune I am to read,” he corrected himself. ”It has been your fortune to open that new world to me. That can never be undone--those gates can never be closed--no matter where the paths may lead. Those two paths go down to the future--as all paths must--even as this road leads away through the valley to the sunset. Zen--if only, like this road, they could run side by side to the sunset--Oh! Zen, if they could?”
”I know,” she said, and as she raised her face he saw that her eyes were wet. ”I know--if only they could!”
There was a little sob in her voice, and in her beauty and distress she was altogether irresistible. He reached out his arms and would have taken her in them, but she thrust her hands in his and held herself back. She turned the diamond deliberately to his eyes. She could feel his grip relax and apparently grow suddenly cold. He stood speechless, like one dazed--benumbed.