Part 32 (1/2)

Grey-gowned, grey-eyed, white-faced, he thought she was like a moth herself, fragile and impalpable in the gloom, a moth motionless on a flower, and when he saw her smile he thought the moth was making ready for flight.

”I want this to go on for ever,” she said. ”The moor and the night and you. You're such a friend--you and the Pinderwells. I don't know how I should live without you.”

”Do you know what you're saying to me?”

”I'm telling you I like you, and it's true. And you like me. It's so comfortable to know that.”

”Comfortable!”

”Isn't it?”

”Comfortable?” he said again. ”Oh, my love--” He broke off, and looking at each other, both fell dumb.

He got to his feet and looked down with an expression which was strange to her, for into that moment of avowal there had come a fleeting antagonism towards the woman who, in spite of all her gifts to him, had taken his possession of himself: yet through his shamed resentment, he knew that he adored her.

”Zebedee,” she said in a broken voice. ”Oh, isn't it a funny name!

Zebedee, don't look at me like that.”

”How shall I look at you?” he asked, not clearly.

”In the old way. But don't say things.” She sprang up. ”Not tonight.”

”When?” he asked sternly.

”I--don't know. Tonight I feel afraid. It's--too much. I shan't be able to keep it, Zebedee. It's too good. And we can't get this for nothing.”

”I'm willing to pay for it. I want to pay for it, in the pain of parting from you now, in the work of all my days--” He stopped in his realization of how little he had to give. ”I can't tell you,” he added simply.

”Will it hurt you to leave me tonight?” she whispered.

”Yes.”

She touched his sleeve. ”I don't like you to be hurt, yet I like that.

Will you come next Sunday?”

”Not if you're afraid. I can't come to see you if you won't let me say things.”

”I'll try not to be afraid; only, only, say them very softly so that nothing else can hear.”

He laughed and caught her hand and kissed it. ”I shall do exactly what I like,” he said; but as he strode away without another word he knew from something in the way she stood and looked at him, something of patience and resolve, that their future was not in his hands alone.

When he was out of sight and hearing, Helen moved stiffly, as though she waked from a long sleep and was uncertain where she was. The familiar light shone in the kitchen of Brent Farm, yet the house seemed unreal and remote, marooned in the high heather. The heather was thick and rich that year, and the flowers touched her hands. The smell of honey was heavy in the air, and thousands of small, pale moths made a honey-coloured cloud between the purple moor and the night blue of the sky. If she strained her ears, Helen could hear the singing of Halkett's stream and it said things she had not heard before. A sound of voices came from the road and she knew that some faithful Christians of the moor were returning from their wors.h.i.+p in the town: she remembered them crude and ugly in their Sunday clothes, but they gathered mystery from distance and the night. Perhaps they came from that chapel where Zebedee had spent his unhappy hours. She turned and her hands swept the heather flowers. This was now his praying place, as it had always been hers, and when the Easter fires came again they would pray to them together.

At the garden door her hand fell from the latch and she faced the moor.

She lifted her arms and dropped them in a kind of pleading for mercy from those whom she had served faithfully; then she smoothed her face and went into the house.

In the drawing-room, Mildred Caniper was sitting on the sofa, and near her John and Lily had disposed themselves like guests.

Helen stopped in the doorway. ”Then the light in your house meant nothing,” she said reproachfully.