Part 21 (1/2)

”You do not ask whether _I_ believe you?” he spoke quite low.

The silence of the darkening wood was unearthly and her dropped word scarcely stirred it.

”No.” She had never even thought of it.

He himself was inwardly shaken by his own feeling.

”I will believe you if--you will believe me,” was what he said, a singular sharp new desire impelling him.

She merely lifted her face a little so that her eyes rested upon him.

”Because of this tragic thing you must believe me. It will be necessary that you should. What you have thought of me with regard to your mother is not true. You believed it because the world did. Denial on my part would merely have called forth laughter. Why not? When a man who has money and power takes charge of a pretty, penniless woman and pays her bills, the pose of Joseph or Galahad is not a good one for him. My statement would no more have been believed than yours will be believed if you can produce no proof. What you say is what any girl might say in your dilemma, what I should have said would have been what any man might have said. But--I believe you. Do you believe _me_?”

She did not understand why suddenly--though languidly--she knew that he was telling her a thing which was true. It was no longer of consequence but she knew it. And if it was true all she had hated him for so long had been founded on nothing. He had not been bad--he had only _looked_ bad and that he could not help. But what did that matter, either? She could not feel even sorry.

”I will--try,” she answered.

It was no use as yet, he saw. What he was trying to deal with was in a new Dimension.

He held out his hands and helped her to her feet.

”The Wood is growing very dark,” he said. ”We must go. I will take you to Mrs. Bennett's and you can spend the night with her.”

The Wood was growing dark indeed. He was obliged to guide her through the closeness of the undergrowth. They threaded their way along the narrow path and the shadows seemed to close in behind them. Before they reached the end which would have led them out into the open he put his hand on her shoulder and held her back.

”In this Wood--even now--there is Something which must be saved from suffering. It is helpless--it is blameless. It is not you--it is not Donal. G.o.d help it.”

He spoke steadily but strangely and his voice was so low that it was almost a whisper--though it was not one. For the first time she felt something stir in her stunned mind--as if thought were wakening--fear--a vague quaking. Her wan small face began to wonder and in the dark roundness of her eyes a question was to be seen like a drowned thing slowly rising from the deeps of a pool. But she asked no question. She only waited a few moments and let him look at her until she said at last in a voice as near a whisper as his own.

”I--will believe you.”

CHAPTER XVII

He was alone with the d.u.c.h.ess. The doors were closed, and the world shut out by her own order. She leaned against the high back of her chair, watching him intently as she listened. He walked slowly up and down the room with long paces. He had been doing it for some time and he had told her from beginning to end the singular story of what had happened when he found Robin lying face downward on the moss in Mersham Wood.

This is what he was saying in a low, steady voice.

”She had not once thought of what most women would have thought of before anything else. If I were speaking to another person than yourself I should say that she was too ignorant of the world. To you I will say that she is not merely a girl--she is the unearthly luckless embodiment of the pure spirit of Love. She knew only wors.h.i.+p and the rapt giving of gifts. Her unearthliness made him forget earth himself. Folly and madness of course! Incredible madness--it would seem to most people--a decently intelligent lad losing his head wholly and not regaining his senses until it was too late to act sanely. But perhaps not quite incredible to you and me. There must have been days which seemed to him--and lads like him--like the last hours of a condemned man. In the midst of love and terror and the agony of farewells--what time was there for sanity?”

”You _believe_ her?” the d.u.c.h.ess said.

”Yes,” impersonally. ”In spite of the world, the flesh and the devil. I also know that no one else will. To most people her story will seem a thing trumped up out of a fourth rate novel. The law will not listen to it. You will--when you see her unawakened face.”

”I have seen it,” was the d.u.c.h.ess' interpolation. ”I saw it when she went upon her knees and prayed that I would let her go to Mersham Wood.

There was something inexplicable in her remoteness from fear and shame.

She was only woe's self. I did not comprehend. I was merely a baffled old woman of the world. Now I begin to see. I believe her as you do. The world and the law will laugh at us because we have none of the accepted reasons for our belief. But I believe her as you do--absurd as it will seem to others.”

”Yes, it will seem absurd,” Coombe said slowly pacing. ”But here she is--and here _we_ are!”