Part 21 (2/2)

They joined Deacon by the fire. ”Am I able to help?” she asked him.

”Give me that plate,” he said, lifting his hand and pointing. She did so, then became very quiet. He did not really want her help. Derek sat close to her, attentive. He was watching her indulgently, enjoying her.

”Women should always have their hair down.”

At the comment Deacon glanced up briefly, then down again. His face looked heavy and impa.s.sive. He hung forward a little, staring at the sizzling pan. He never said a word. A certain resentment filled him. He was like a victim there.

Cedrik soon accompanied them. ”Give me some of this; it looks good,” he said, helping himself from the pan. ”Got coffee?”

”Tea,” answered Deacon.

Their time together round the fire was not chatty nor cosy, but silent. Deacon sat as a stranger among them. As night fell darker, the firelight played more and more strongly on his features, and the shadow upon him seemed to grow darker and heavier.

Derek stabbed at his food. ”This is good,” he said, trying to make small talk. He took careful mouthfuls; after his experience in Cheydon he had a distinct fear of anything remotely hot, and his cousin was known to have a heavy hand with spices in his cooking.

Deacon was the first to rise. Magenta noticed he scarcely seemed to eat. His face looked pale and peaked. ”Will you have nothing more?” she asked.

”No. I'm going to bed.” He sounded angry and tired.

When he was gone, Cedrik said to Magenta, ”He's apt at making strangers of all the people he meets.”

”Have you known him from boyhood?” she asked at length.

”Never for any extended period,” said Cedrik. ”All his life he's lived far from us.” He frowned, snapping a twig between his fingers, tossing it aside. ”He is much changed.” He hesitated, then asked, ”Has he told you his reasons for going to Terium?”

Magenta looked down. ”No, he has said nothing to me.”

Alone in his bed, Deacon went to sleep feeling a greater emptiness than hunger.

Wrath, vengeance, hatred, cannot breathe in the same atmosphere as love, and so it was that love began to wither and withdraw, not without bitter consequences and painful conflicts. Deacon had made himself insensitive toward her, but it was damaging to his own health. It affected him, yet still he persisted. She wanted to protect him from pain and hurt, but her presence seemed to cause him more distress. Though it was difficult, she understood that whatever trouble and heartache he suffered, he wanted to be left to himself, and so she remained apart. She did not, however, love him the less for having to love at a more conscious distance. In her heart she remained constant to him.

After dinner one night, Deacon stationed himself under a tree somewhat apart from the others. His relentlessly agitated mind was labouring with heavy thoughts as he struggled to maintain the necessary courage to take a life, acutely struggling with his own soul. Magenta watched him in his loneliness. It was difficult to keep silent when silence was so painful.

The result of too many haunted nights was beginning to show upon his features. Briefly he turned his face toward her. That glance had revealed a desperate appeal, but he in the same instance compelled his countenance to resume its former expression of detached indifference. He was very much estranged. Magenta sat irresolute for some time, then arose and went quietly away. The cold separation between them was cruel.

”Look at the stubborn devil,” said Derek suddenly, as if it had been on his mind all the while. Cedrik glanced up to see his attention was burning on Deacon. ”One of us must say something.”

”No, leave him to himself,” Cedrik said with a measure of sternness. ”It will only bring harm.”

Derek made an abrupt sound and poked the ground with a stick. They spoke no more but were too comfortable with one another for the silence to be awkward. Derek watched Magenta with increasing sensitivity. He thought her love the truest kind, where all is given in exchange for nothing. It pained him to see her suffer. She was as if dying for the love of him, for she was daily growing more and more faint.

In the manner of a man who has nerved himself up to the a.s.sertion of a difficult task, Derek approached Deacon. He tried to appear casual, speaking of whatever came to mind. Deacon frowned at the mumbled trivialities. ”Are you talking in your sleep? What are you trying to say to me?”

”You look like you've been kicked by a horse.”

Deacon smiled, not without some resentment. ”Is that what you came to tell me?”

Derek became serious and resting his brow against the rough bark, looked down at his cousin. ”The dullest can see you love her.” Deacon's countenance darkened instantly. ”You do, do you not?” The expression on his face Derek took at once as guilt. He said excitedly, ”Then love her, man. For pity's sake, can you not see how she suffers? How is she to know you hold affection for her, if you remain cynically observant from the shadows?”

”The day I take advice from you in matters of the heart is the day I hang myself.”

”She needs you,” said Derek with greater emphasis. ”If I, of all people, can see it, how can you alone be blind to it?”

Deacon rose to leave, saying in a tone intended to quench conversation, ”She would not be happy to find you discussing such things with me.” As he turned, his eyes encountered those of the young woman who was the subject of their meeting. She was sitting beside Cedrik, and he was saying something to which she was listening with only partial attention. For a moment the eyes of both were locked; then each turned from the other, Magenta with disappointment, Deacon with vexation.

Deacon began to make his way further from camp, but his antagonist persisted at his shoulder. Derek's persistent encouragements hara.s.sed him almost intolerably. Both came to an abrupt stop when he at last said, ”What do you want from me? It is her failing to harbour fascination for me.”

”She loves you!” said Derek. ”And I would be greatly mistaken if you have not given her reason. More than friendly, I should say.”

”You're going a step too far.” His chest was hot in an anguish of suppression.

”d.a.m.n it, why do you have to be so callous with her?” Deacon looked away into the night, swallowing his bitterness. Derek waited several moments before venturing to speak further. ”Don't sit in the shadows brooding. She's afraid to go near you.”

Deacon shook his head wearily. ”She does not fear me.”

”She does; any fool can see it! She's terrified of you, and not a person in this world would blame her. You've been as black as death. Why are you so disturbed? She is a prize. She is worth striving for, and yet you would treat her as the plague and bless the stars at getting rid of her. She doesn't understand.”

Derek went on in this accusing tone, exasperated to the point of desperation. The other remained sullenly silent. The personal offences to himself he let pa.s.s, but when Derek persisted on her languishment he began to grow hot.

”Don't presume to understand her after a few mere days of play,” he said bitterly.

Contempt arose in Derek. ”She has confided in me more these past days than she has you.”

Deacon turned and took hold of him violently. The change in his manner was very sudden. ”Speak not another word to me, or we shall cross one another again.” He had been struggling with himself all this while.

”I had hoped,” said Derek, ”you would go to her and speak your heart freely. Now I pray you stay far from her.”

Deacon's face paled visibly. He released Derek with a rough push, muttering something about being a fool. He turned and began to walk.

”I'm not such a fool to be blind to her!” cried Derek with an outburst of acc.u.mulated spite. When left alone he winced with confusion and pain. Instead of awakening tender impulses in Deacon, he seemed only to succeed in rousing anger and jealousy.

”I told you to let it alone,” said his brother, when he returned.

Chapter35.

Tanglewood -he night was clear, the moon full. Magenta and the brothers stood about the fire. Derek was about to show them something. Deacon sat by himself, lost in the labyrinth of his own mind, when he glimpsed that Derek was fiddling with a pouch of sorts. He started to his feet to investigate.

Cedrik cautioned his brother, ”Don't play with such things.”

Derek announced that he was going to do it.

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