Part 28 (1/2)
He lay silent for a minute before he turned to her again. ”You see, I have been some time in this country, and never have done anything worth mentioning. Chopping trees and driving cattle are no doubt useful occupations, but they don't lead to anything. I feel that I am, so to speak, on my probation. I have still to win my spurs.”
”I wonder if that is one of the ideas Miss Waynefleet gave you?”
Nasmyth smiled. ”I really believe it originated with her, but, as a matter of fact, it might have gone no further, which is an admission.
Still, the desire to win those spurs has been growing so strong of late that I can't resist it. In one way, I scarcely think that is very astonis.h.i.+ng.”
Violet looked away from him, for she saw the gleam in his eyes, and fancied she understood what the new motive he had hinted at might be.
Still, he did not appear disposed to mention it.
”Then you would have to go away?” she asked.
A flush crept into Nasmyth's face. She was a woman of his own caste, and probably without intending it, she had shown him in many ways that she was not averse from him. He felt his heart beat fast when for a moment she met his gaze.
”The trouble is that if I do not go I shall never have the right to come back again,” he told her.
”Then,” replied the girl very softly, ”you wish to come back?”
”That is why I am going. There are those spurs to win. I have to make my mark.”
”But it is sometimes a little difficult to make one's mark, isn't it?
You may be ever so long, and it must be a little hazardous in that horrible canon.”
”If it gives me the right to come back, I think it will be very well worth while.”
”But suppose you don't succeed, after all?”
”That,” admitted Nasmyth, ”is a thing I daren't contemplate, because, if it happened, it is scarcely likely that any of my friends at Bonavista would ever be troubled with me again.”
Violet looked away from him. ”Ah,” she said, ”don't you think that would be a little hard on them? Is it very easy for you to go away?”
The restraint Nasmyth had imposed upon himself suddenly deserted him.
He moved a little nearer to her, and seized one of her hands. She sat still, and made no effort to draw it away from him.
”I had never meant to say what I am going to say just now,” he declared. ”I had meant to wait until there was something successfully accomplished to my credit. I am, you see, a thriftless, wandering adventurer--one who has taken things as they came, and never has been serious. When I have shown that I can also be something else, I shall ask you formally if you will marry me. Until then the thing is, of course, out of the question.”
He broke off for a moment, and held her silent by a gesture until he went on again. ”I have been swept away, and even if you were willing to make it, I would take no promise from you. Until I have won the right to come back you must be absolutely free. Now you know this, it would be very much wiser if I went away as soon as possible.”
”Ah,” the girl answered with a thrill in her voice, ”whenever you come back you will find me ready to listen to you.”
Nasmyth let her hand go. ”Now,” he a.s.serted, ”I think I cannot fail.
Still, it must be remembered that you are absolutely free.”
He would have said something more, but there was just then a laugh and a patter of feet on the path above, and, looking up, he saw two of Mrs. Acton's guests descending the bluff.
CHAPTER XX
NASMYTH GOES AWAY