They were to start on the 8th of August, and it was now the 5th. Packing had begun, and Crewdson, as usual, was troublesome. He had the habit of appearing before Lucy and presenting some small deficiency as a final cause of ruin and defeat. "I can't find any of the Brown Polish, ma'am. I don't know what Mr. Macartney will do without it." This, or something like it, had become a classic in the family. It had always been part of the fun of going away. But this year Lucy was fretted by it. She supposed herself run down and whipped herself to work. She found herself, too, lingering about the house, with an affection for the familiar aspect of corners, vistas, tricks of light and shadow, which she had never thought to possess. She felt extremely unwilling to leave it all. It was safety, it was friendliness; it asked no effort of her. To turn away from its lustrous and ordered elegance and face the unknown gave her apain in the heart. It was odd to feel homesick before she had left home; but that was the sum of it. She was homesick. Urquhart was very much in her mind; a letter of his was in her writing-table drawer, under lock and key; but Urquhart seemed part of a vague menace now, while James, though he did his unconscious utmost to defeat himself, got his share of the sunset glow upon the house. Fanciful, nervous, weary of it all as she was, she devoted herself to her duties; and then, on this fifth of August, in the afternoon, she had a waking vision, perfectly distinct, and so vivid that, disembodied and apart, she could see herself enacting it. It was followed by a shivering fit and depression; but that must tell its own tale.
The vision occurred while she was on her knees, busied beside a trunk, turning over garments of lace and fine linen and pale blue ribbons which a maid, in the same fair attitude, was bestowing as she received them. Lancelot was out for the afternoon with Crewdson and a friend. They had gone to the Zoological Gardens, and would not be back till late. She had the house to herself; it was cool and shadowed from the sun. TheSquare, muffled in the heat, gave no disturbing sounds. Looking up suddenly, for no apparent reason, she saw herself with Jimmy Urquhart in a great empty, stony place, and felt the dry wind which blew upon them both. All but her own face was visible; of that she saw nothing but the sharp outline of her cheek, which was very white. She saw herself holding her hat, bending sideways to the gale; she saw her skirt cling about her legs, and flack to get free. She wondered why she didn't hold it down. The wind was a hot one; she felt that it was so. It made her head ache, and burned her cheek-bone. Urquhart was quite visible. He looked into the teeth of the wind, frowning and fretful. Why didn't she say something to him? She had a conviction that it was useless. "There's nothing to say, nothing to say." That rang in her head, like a church bell. "Nothing to say, nothing to say." A sense of desolation and total loss oppressed her. She had no hope. The vacancy, the silence, the enormous dry emptiness about her seemed to shut out all her landmarks. Why didn't she think of Lancelot? She wondered why, but realised that Lancelot meant nothing out there. She saw herself turn about. She cried out, "James! James!" startedup with a sense of being caught, and saw the maid's face of scare. She was awake in a moment. "What is it, ma'am? What is it?"
Lucy had recovered her faculties: "Nothing, Emily; it's nothing. I was giddy." But she was shivering and couldn't go on. "I think I'll lie down for a minute," she said, and asked for the aspirin. She took two tabloids and a sip of water, was covered up and left to herself. Emily tiptoed away, full of interest in the affair.
The shivering fit lasted the better part of an hour. Lucy crouched and suffered, open-eyed but without any consciousness. Something had happened, was happening still; a storm was raging overhead; she lay quaking and waited for it to pass. She fell asleep, slept profoundly, and awoke slowly to a sense of things. She had no doubt of what lay immediately before her. Disrelish of the Norwegian expedition was now a reasonable thing. Either it must be given up, or the disaster reckoned with.Advienne que pourra.But in either case she must "have it out" with James. What did that mean? Jimmy Urquhart would be thrown over. He would go—and she would not. She lay, picturing rather than reasoning; saw him superbly capable, directing everything. She felt a pride in him, and in herself for discovering how fine he was. His fineness, indeed, was a thing shared. She felt a sinking of the heart to know that she could not be there. But the mere thought of that sickened her. Out of the question.
She must "have it out" with James. That might be rather dreadful; it might take her where she must refuse to go—but on the whole, she didn't think it need. The certainty that she couldn't go to Norway, that James must be made to see it, was a moral buttress. Timidity of James would not prevail against it. Besides that, deeply within herself, lay the conviction that James was kind if you took him the right way. He was irritable, and very annoying when he was sarcastic; but he was good at heart. And it was odd, she thought, that directly she got into an awkward place with a flirtation, her first impulse was to go to James to get her out. In her dream she had called to him, though Urquhart had been there. Why was that?
She was thinking now like a child, which indeed she was where such matters were concerned. She was not really contrite for what she had done, neither regretted that she had done it, nor that itwas done with. She wanted to discharge her bosom of perilous stuff. James would forgive her. He must not know, of course, what he was forgiving; but—yes, he would forgive her.
At six or thereabouts, listening for it, she heard the motor bring James home; she heard his latch-key, and the shutting of the door behind him. Her heart beat high, but she did not falter. He was reading a letter in the hall when she came downstairs; he was very much aware of her, but pretended not to be. She stood on the bottom stair looking at him with wide and fixed eyes; but he would not look up. He was not just then in a mood either to make advances or to receive them. His grievance was heavy upon him.
"James," said Lucy, "I've been listening for you."
"Too good," said he, and went on with his letter.
"I wanted to tell you that I don't think—that I don't much want to go to Norway."
Then he did look up, keenly, with a drawn appearance about his mouth, showing his teeth. "Eh?" he said. "Oh, absurd." He occupied himself with his letter, folding it for its envelope,while she watched him with a pale intensity which ought to have told him, and perhaps did tell him, what she was suffering.
"I don't think you should call me absurd," she said. "I was never very certain of it."
"But, my dearest child, you made me certain, at any rate," he told her. "You made everybody certain. So much so that I have the tickets in my pocket at this moment."
"I'm very sorry. I could pay for mine, of course—and I'm sure Vera would look after Lancelot. I wouldn't disappoint him for the world."
"What are you going to tell Urquhart?" said James. Her eyes paled.
"I believe that he would take it very simply," she said. James plunged his hands into his pockets. He thought that they were on the edge of the gulf.
"Look here, Lucy," he said; "hadn't you better tell me something more about this? Perhaps you will come into the library for a few minutes." He led the way without waiting for her, and she stood quaking where she was.
She was making matters worse: she saw that now. Naturally she couldn't tell James the realstate of the case, because that would involve her in history. James would have to understand that he had been believed to have wooed her when he had done nothing of the kind. That was a thing which nothing in the world would bring her to reveal to him. And if she left that out and confined herself to her own feelings for Urquhart—how was all that to be explained? Was it fair to herself, or to Urquhart, to isolate the flowering of an affair unless you could show the germinating of it? Certainly it wasn't fair to herself—as for Urquhart, it may be that he didn't deserve any generous treatment. She knew that there was no defence for him, though plenty of excuse—possibly. No—she must go through with the Norway business. Meantime James was waiting for her.
She stood by the library table while James, back to the fireplace, lifted his head and watched her through cigar-smoke. He had no mercy for her at this moment. Suspicions thronged his darkened mind. But nothing of her rueful beauty escaped him. The flush of sleep was upon her, and her eyes were full of trouble.
"It isn't that I have any reason which would appeal to you," she told him. She faltered hertale. "I think I have been foolish—I know that I'm very tired and worried; but—I have had presentiments."
James clicked his tongue, which he need not have done—as he knew very well. But he had not often been arbiter of late.
"My child," he said, "really—" and annoyed her.
"Of course you are impatient. I can't help it, all the same. I am telling you the truth. I don't know what is going to happen. I feel afraid of something—I don't know what—"
"Run down," said James, looking keenly at her, but kindly; "end of the season. Two days at sea will do the job for you. Anyhow, my dear, we go." He threw himself in his deep chair, stretched his legs out and looked at Lucy.
She was deeply disappointed; she had pictured it so differently. He would have understood her, she had thought. But he seemed to be in his worst mood. She stood, the picture of distressful uncertainty, hot and wavering; her head hung, her hand moving a book about on the table. To his surprise and great discomfort he now discerned that she was silently crying. Tears were falling, she made no effort to stop them, nor to concealthem. Her weakness and dismay were too much for her. She accepted the relief, and neither knew nor cared whether he saw it.
James was not hard-hearted unless his vanity was hurt. This was the way to touch him, as he was prepared to be touched. "My child," he said, "why, what's the matter with you?" She shook her head, tried to speak, failed, and went on crying.
"Lucy," said James, "come here to me." She obeyed him at once.
Something about her attitude moved him to something more than pity. Her pretty frock and her refusal to be comforted by it; her youthful act—for Lucy had never yet cried before him; her flushed cheeks, her tremulous lips—what? If I could answer the question I should resolve the problem of the flight of souls. He looked at her and knew that he desired her above all things. A Lucy in tears was a new Lucy; a James who could afford to let his want be seen was a new James. That which stirred him—pity, need, desire, kindness—vibrated in his tones. To hear was to obey.
He took her two hands and drew her down to his knee. He made her sit there, embraced herwith his arm. "There, my girl, there," he said; "now let me know all about it. Upon my soul, you are a baffling young woman. You will, and you won't; and then you cry, and I become sentimental. I shall end by falling in love with you."
At these strange words she broke down altogether, and sobbed her soul out upon his shoulder. Again he assured himself that he had never seen her cry before. He was immensely touched by it, and immensely at his ease too. His moral status was restored to him. He knew now what he wanted. "You poor little darling, I can't bear to see you cry so. There then—cry away, if it does you good. What does me good is to have you here. Now what made you so meek as to come when I called you? And why weren't you afraid that I should eat you up? So I might, Lucy, you know; for you've made me madly in love with you."
It seemed to her beating heart that indeed he was. He held her very close, kissed her wet cheeks, her wet eyes and her lips. She struggled in his embrace, but not for long. She yielded, and returned his kisses. So they clung together, and in the silence, while time seemed to stand still, itreally did nothing of the kind; for if he gained experience she lost it.
He must have grown more experienced, for he was able to return without embarrassment to the affairs so strangely interrupted. She must have grown less so, because she answered him simply, like a child. He asked her what had upset her, and she told him, a dream. A dream? Had she been asleep? No, it was a waking dream. She told him exactly what it was. She was with Mr. Urquhart in a horrible place—a dry, sandy place with great rocks in it. "And where did I come in?" "You didn't come in. That was why I called you." "You called for me, did you? But Urquhart was there?" "Yes, I suppose he was still there. I didn't look." "Why did you call for me, Lucy?" "Because I was frightened." "I'm grateful to you for that. That's good news to me," he said; and then when he kissed her again, she opened her eyes very wide, and said, "Oh, James, I thought you didn't care for me any more."
James, master of himself, smiled grimly. "I thought as much," he said; "and so you became interested in somebody else?"
Lucy sat up. "No," she said, "I became interested in you first."
That beat him. "You became interested inme? Why? Because I didn't care for you?"
"No," she said sharply; "no! Because I thought that you did."
James felt rather faint. "I can't follow you. You thought that I didn't, you said?" Lucy was now excited, and full of her wrongs.
"How extraordinary! Surely you see? I had reason to think that you cared for me very much—oh, very much indeed; and then I found out that you didn't care a bit more than usual; and then—well, then—" James, who was too apt to undervalue people, did not attempt to pursue the embroilment. But he valued her in this melting mood. He held her very close.
"Well," he said, "and now you find that I do care—and what then?"
She looked at him, divinely shy. "Oh, if you really care—"
This would have made any man care. "Well, if I really do—?"
"Ah!" She hid her face on his shoulder. "I shall love to be in Norway."
James felt very triumphant; but true to type, he sent her upstairs to dress with the needless injunction to make herself look pretty.
Presently, however, he stood up and stared hard at the ground. "Good Lord!" he said. "I wonder what the devil—" Then he raised his eyebrows to their height. "This is rather interesting."
The instinct was strong in him to make her confess—for clearly there was something to be known. But against that several things worked. One was his scorn of the world at large. He felt that it was beneath him to enquire what that might be endeavouring against his honour or peace. Another—and a very new feeling to him—was one of compassion. The poor girl had cried before him—hidden her face on his shoulder and cried. To use strength, male strength, upon that helplessness; to break a butterfly on a wheel—upon his soul, he thought he couldn't do it.
And after all—whether it was Lingen or Urquhart—he was safe. He knew he was safe because he wanted her. He knew that hecouldnot want what was not for him. That was against Nature. True to type again, he laughed at himself, but owned it. She had been gone but five or ten minutes, but he wanted to see her again—now. He craved the sight of that charming diffidence of the woman who knows herself desired. He became embarrassed as he thought of it, but did not cease to desire. Should he yield to the whim—or hold himself...?
At that moment Lancelot was admitted. He heard him race upstairs calling, "Mamma, Mamma! frightfully important!" That decided the thing. He opened his door, listening to what followed. He heard Lucy's voice, "I'm here. You can come in...." and was amazed. Was that Lucy's voice? She was happy, then. He knew that by her tone. There was a lift in it, atimbre. Was it just possible, by some chance, that he had been a damned fool? He walked the room in some agitation, then went hastily upstairs to dress.
Whether to a new James or not, dinner had a new Lucy to reveal; a Lucy full of what he called "feminine charm"; a Lucy who appealed to him across the table for support against a positive Lancelot; who brought him in at all points; who was concerned for his opinion; who gave him shy glances, who could even afford to be pert. He,being essentially a fair-weather man, was able to meet her half-way—no more than that, because he was what he was, always his own detective. The discipline which he had taught himself to preserve was for himself first of all.
Lancelot noticed his father. "I say," he said, when he and Lucy were in the drawing-room, "Father's awfully on the spot, isn't he? It's Norway, I expect. Bucks him up."
"Norway is enough to excite anybody," Lucy said—"even me."
"Oh, you!" Lancelot was scornful. "Anything would excite you. Look at Mr. Urquhart."
Lucy flickered. "How do you mean?" Lancelot was warm for his absent friend.
"Why, you used to take a great interest in all his adventures—you know you did."
This must be faced. "Of course I did. Well—?"
"Well," said Lancelot, very acutely, "now they seem rather ordinary—rather chronic."Chronicwas a word of Crewdson's, used as an augmentive. Lucy laughed, but faintly.
"Yes, I expect they are chronic. But I think Mr. Urquhart is very nice."
"He's ripping," said Lancelot, in a stare.
James in the drawing-room that evening was studiously himself, and Lucy fought with her restlessness, and prevailed against it. He was shy, and spun webs of talk to conceal his preoccupations. Lucy watched him guardedly, but with intense interest. It was when she went upstairs that the amazing thing happened.
She stood by him, her hand once more upon his shoulder. He had his book in his hand.
"I'm going," she said. "You have been very sweet to me. I don't deserve it, you know."
He looked up at her, quizzing her through the detested glass. "You darling," he said calmly, and she thrilled. Where had she heard that phrase? At theWalküre!
"You darling," he said; "who could help it?"
"Oh, but—" she pouted now. "Oh, but you can help it often—if you like."
"But, you see, I don't like. I should hate myself if I thought that I could."
"Do let me take your glass away for one minute."
"You may do what you please with it, or me."
The glass in eclipse, she looked down at him, considering, hesitating, choosing, poised. "Oh,I was right. You look much nicer without it. Some day I'll tell you."
He took her hand and kept it. "Some day you shall tell me a number of things."
She did not cease to look at him, but he saw fear in her eyes. "Some day, perhaps, but not yet."
"No," said he, "not yet—perhaps."
"Will you trust me?"
"I always have."
She sighed. "Oh, you are good. I didn't know how good." Then she turned to go. "I told you I was going—and I am. Good night."
He put his book down. She let his eyeglass fall. He drew her to his knee, and looked at her.
"It's not good night," he said. "That's to come."
She gave him a startled, wide look, and then her lips, before she fled.
That enchanted land of sea and rock, of mountains rooted in the water, and water which pierces the secret valleys of the mountains, worked its spell upon our travellers, and freed them from themselves for a while. For awhile they were as singleminded as the boys, content to live and breathe that wine-tinctured air, and watch out those flawless days and serene grey nights. London had sophisticated some of them almost beyond redemption: Francis Lingen was less man than sensitive gelatine; James was the offspring of a tradition and a looking-glass. But the zest and high spirits of Urquhart were catching, and after a week Francis Lingen ceased to murmur to ladies in remote corners, and James to care whether his clothes were pressed. Everybody behaved well: Urquhart, who believed that he possessed Lucy's heart, James, who knew now what he possessed, Vera Nugent, who was content to sit and look on, and Lucy herself, who simplyand honestly forgot everything except the beauty of the world, and the joy of physical exertion. She had been wofully ill on the passage from Newcastle and had been invisible from beginning to end. But from the moment of landing at Bergen she had been transformed. She was now the sister of her son, a wild, wilful, impetuous creature, a nymph of the heath, irresponsible and self-indulgent, taking what she could get of comfort and cherishing, and finding a boundless appetite for it. It was something, perhaps, to know in her heart that every man in the party was in love with her; it was much more—for the moment at least—to be without conscience in the matter. She had put her conscience to sleep for once, drugged it with poppy and drowsy syrups, and led the life of a healthy and vigorous animal.
Urquhart enjoyed that; he was content to wait and watch. For the time James did not perceive it. The beauty and freshness of this new world was upon him. Francis Lingen, born to cling, threw out tentative tendrils to Margery Dacre.
Margery Dacre was a very pretty girl; she had straw-coloured hair and a bright complexion. She wore green, especially in the water. Urquhart called her Undine, and she was mostly knownas the Mermaid. She had very little mind, but excellent manners; and was expensive without seeming to spend anything. For instance, she brought no maid, because she thought that it might have looked ostentatious, and always made use of Lucy's, who didn't really want one. That was how Margery Dacre contrived to seem very simple.
For the moment Urquhart took natural command. He knew the country, he owned the motor-boat; he believed that he owned Lucy, and he believed that James was rather a fool. He thought that he had got the better of James. But this could not last, because James was no more of a fool than he was himself, though his intelligence worked in a different way. Things flashed upon Urquhart, who then studied them intensely and missed nothing. They dawned on James, who leisurely absorbed them, and allowed them to work out their own development.
It was very gradually now dawning upon James that Urquhart had assumed habits of guidance over Lucy and was not aware of any reason why he should relinquish them. He believed that he understood her thoroughly; he read her as a pliant, gentle nature, easily imposed upon, andreally at the mercy of any unscrupulous man who was clever enough to see how she should be treated. He had never thought that before. It was the result of his cogitations over recent events. So while he kept his temper and native jealousy under easy control, he watched comfortably—as well he might—and gained amusement, as he could well afford to do, from Urquhart's marital assumptions. When he was tempted to interfere, or to try a fall with Urquhart, he studiously refrained. If Urquhart said, as he did sometimes, "I advise you to rest for a bit," James calmly embraced the idea. If Urquhart brought out a cloak or a wrap and without word handed it to her, James, watching, did not determine to forestall him on the next occasion. And Lucy, as he admitted, behaved beautifully, behaved perfectly. There were no grateful looks from her, such as he would expect to see pass between lovers. Keenly as he watched her, he saw no secret exchange. On the other hand, her eyes frequently sought his own, as if she wanted him to understand that she was happy, as if, indeed, she wanted him to be happy by such an understanding. This gave him great pleasure, and touched him too. If he had been capable of it, he would have told her; but hewas not. It was part of his nature to treat those whom he lovedde haut en bas. He found that it was so, and hated himself for it. The one thing he really grudged Urquhart was his simplicity and freedom from ulterior motive. Urquhart was certainly able to enjoy the moment for the moment's worth. But James must always be calculating exactly what it was worth, and whether to be enhanced by what might follow it.
He was kinder to her than he had ever been before. In fact, he was remarkably interesting. She told him of it in their solitary moments of greatest intimacy. "This is my honeymoon," she said, "and I never had one before."
"Goose," said he, "don't attempt to deceive me." But she reasserted it.
"It's true, James. You may have loved me in your extraordinary way, but I'm sure I didn't love you. I was much too frightened of you."
"Well," he laughed, "I don't discover any terrors now." She wouldn't say that there were none. So far as she dared she was honest.
"We aren't on an exact equality. We never shall be. But we are much nearer. Own it."
He held her closely and kissed her. "You are a little darling, if that's what you mean."
"Oh, but it isn't; it isn't at all what I mean. Why, you wouldn't call me 'little' if you didn't know you were superior. Because I'm rather tall for a woman."
He knew that she was right, and respected her for the discernment. "My love," he said, "I'm a self-centred, arrogant beast, and I don't like to think about it. But you'll make something of me if you think it worth while. But listen to me, Lucy. I'm going to talk to you seriously." Then he whispered in her ear: "Some day you must talk to me." He could feel her heart beat, he could feel her shiver as she clung.
"Yes," she said very low; "yes, I promise—but not now."
"No," he said, "not now. I want to be happy as long as I can." She started away, and he felt her look at him in the dark.
"You'll be happier when I've told you," she said.
"Why do you say that?"
"Because I shall be happier myself then," she said; and James hoped that she was right about him. One thing amazed him to discover—how women imputed their own virtues to the men they loved. It struck him a mortal blow to realise thathis evident happiness would give Lucy joy, whereas hers would by no means necessarily add to his. "What does give me happiness, then?" he asked himself; "what could conceivably increase my zest for life? Evidence of power, exercise of faculty: so far as I know, nothing else whatever. A parlous state of affairs. But it is the difference, I presume, between a giving creature and a getting one which explains all. Is a man, then, never to give, and be happy? Has he ever tried? Is a woman not to get? Has she ever had a chance of it?" He puzzled over these things in his prosaic, methodical way. One thing was clear to everybody there but Urquhart in his present fatuity: Lucy was thriving. She had colour, light in her eyes, a bloom upon her, a dewiness, an auroral air. She sunned herself like a bird in the dust; she bathed her body, and tired herself with long mountain and woodland walks. When she was alone with her husband she grew as sentimental as a housemaid and as little heedful of the absurd. She grew young and amazingly pretty, the sister of her son. It would be untrue to say that, being in clover, she was unaware of it. For a woman of one-and-thirty to have her husband for a lover, and her lover for a foil, is a gift of thegods. So she took it—with the sun and green water, and wine-bright air. Let the moralists battle it out with the sophists: it did her a world of good.
Macartney fell easily into habits, and was slow to renounce them. Having got into the way of making love to his wife, he by no means abandoned it; at the same time, and in as easy a fashion, it came to be a matter of routine with him to play piquet with Vera Nugent after dinner. It was she who had proposed it, despairing of a quartette, or even of a trio, for the Bridge which was a dram to her. Here also James would have been only too happy; but nobody else would touch it. Lucy never played cards; Urquhart, having better things to do, said that he never did. Margery Dacre and Lingen preferred retirement and their own company. Lingen, indeed, was exhibiting his heart to the pale-haired girl as if it was a specimen-piece. "I am really a very simple person," he told her, "one of those who, trusting once, trust for ever. I don't expect to be understood, I have no right to ask for sympathy. That would be toomuch to look for in a jostling, market-day world like ours. But I cherish one or two very fragrant memories of kindnesses done. I open, at need, a drawer; and, like the scent of dry rose-leaves, or lavender, a sweet hint steals out that there are good women in the world, that life is not made up of receipted bills. Don't you understand the value of such treasures? I am sure that you do. You always seem to me so comprehending in your outlook." Margery said that she hoped she was.
It was Lucy's business immediately after dinner to see that Lancelot was decently abed. The lad took the last ounce out of himself before that time came, and was to be brought by main force to the bath, crimson to the roots of his hair and dripping with sweat. Protesting to the uttermost, still panting with his final burst in the open, she saw to it that he was quiet before she could be so herself. Then she was free, and Urquhart found—or looked for—his chance. The woods called her, the wondrous silver-calm of the northern night. She longed to go; but now she dreaded Urquhart, and dared not trust herself. It had come to this, that, possessed as she was, and happy in possession, he and all that he stood for could blot thewhole fair scene up in cold fog. That was how she looked at it in the first blush of her new life.
He didn't understand that; but he saw that she was nervous, and set himself to reassure her. He assumed his dryest tone, his most negligent manner. When she came downstairs from Lancelot, and after watching the card-players, fingering a book or magazine, drifted to the open window and stood or leaned there, absorbing the glory of the night—Urquhart left her, and pulled at his pipe. When she spoke to the room at large—"Oh, you stuffy people, will you never understand that all the world is just out here?" he was the first to laugh at her, though he would have walked her off into that world of magic and dream, straight from the window where she stood. He was a wild idealist himself, and was sure of her. But he must wait her good time.
Often, therefore, she drifted out by herself, and he suffered damnably. But she never went far—he comforted himself with that assurance. "She has the homing instinct. She won't go without me; and she knows that I can't come—but oh, to be kissing her under those birches by the water's edge!"
He was not the only one who was aware that shehad flitted. Macartney was always intensely aware of it, and being by this time exceedingly fond, it tended to spoil his play. So long as Urquhart left her alone he was able to endure it.
Then came an evening when, tending to the open door, she found Urquhart there before her. He had behaved so admirably that her fears were asleep. He acted with the utmost caution, saying just enough, with just enough carelessness of tone, to keep her unsuspicious. The boreal lights were flashing and quivering in the sky: very soon he saw her absorbed in the wonder and beauty of them. "A night," she said, "when anything might happen!"
"Yes, it looks like that," he agreed. "But that is not what enraptures you."
"What do you think enraptures me?" she wished to know.
"The certainty," he replied, "that nothing will."
She waited a while, then said, "Yes, you are right. I don't want anything else to happen."
"You have everything you want, here in the house. Safe to hand! Your Lancelot in bed, your James at cards, and myself at the window. Wonderful! And you are contented?"
"Yes, yes. I ask so little, you see. But you despise me for it."
"God forbid. I promised you that you shouldn't repent this trip. And you don't, I hope?"
Her eyes were wide open and serious. "No, indeed. I never expected to be so happy as this. It never happened to me before." She had no compunctions at all—but he was in the fatuous stage, drugged by his own imaginings.
"That's good. Shall we go down to the water?"
"I think we might," she said, not daring to look back into the room, lest he should think that she feared him.
They strolled leisurely through the wood, she in a soft rapture of delight at the still grey beauty of the night; Urquhart in a state of mind bordering upon frenzy. He gripped himself by both hands to make sure of the mastery. What gave him conviction was his constant sense of Lucy's innocency. This beautiful woman had the heart of a child and the patience of the mother of a god. To shock the one or gibe at the other were a blasphemy he simply couldn't contemplate. What then was to be the end of it? He didn't know;he didn't care. She loved him, he believed; she had kissed him, therefore she must love him. Such women don't give their lips without their hearts. But then she had been scared, and had cried off? Well, that, too, he seemed to understand. That was where her sense of law came in. He could not but remember that it would have come in before, had she known who her lover was. As things fell out, she slipped into love without knowing it. The moment she had known it, she withdrew to the shadow of her hearth. That was his Lucy all over.HisLucy? Yes, for that wasn't the Solicitor's Lucy—if, indeed, the solicitor had a Lucy. But had he? A little weakness of Urquhart's was to pride himself on being a man of whims, and to suppose such twists of the mind his unique possession. All indeed that he had of unique was this, that he invariably yielded to his whims; whereas other people did not.
However, he set a watch upon himself on this night of witchery, and succeeded perfectly. They talked leisurely and quietly—of anything or nothing; the desultory, fragmentary interjections of comment which pass easily between intimates. Lucy's share was replete with soft wonderings atthe beauty of the world. Neither of them answered the other.
Under the birch-trees it was light, but very damp. He wouldn't allow her to stop there, but bade her higher up the hillside. There were pines there which were always dry. "Wait you there," he said; "I'm going back to get you a wrap." She would have stopped him, but he had gone.
Urquhart, walking up sharply to the house, was not at all prepared for Macartney walking as sharply down from it. In fact, he was very much put out, and the more so because from the first James took the upper hand.
"Hulloa," said the lord of the eyeglass.
"Hulloa, yourself," said Urquhart, and stopped, which he need not have done, seeing that Macartney with complete nonchalance continued his walk.
"Seen my wife anywhere?" came from over his shoulder. Urquhart turned on his heels. "Yes," he said, and walked on.
There was an end of one, two and three—as the rhyme goes. Urquhart was hot with rage. That bland, blundering fool, that glasshouse, that damned supercilious ass: all this and more he criedupon James. He scorned him for his jealousy; he cursed him for it; he vowed that he would carry her off before his very eyes. "Let her give the word, lift an eyebrow, and I take her across the world." And the lad too, bless him. What did the quill-driver want of them but credit? Damn him, he hung them up in his house, as tradesmen use the royal arms. He baited for his deans and chapters with them. He walked far into the night in a passion of anger. It never once occurred to him that James was a rival. And there he was right.
He thought that Urquhart had certainly been with Lucy; he knew that he was in love with her; but oddly enough that stimulated instead of quelled him. It enhanced her. It made her love worth keeping. He had a great respect, in his heart of hearts, for Urquhart's validity in a world of action which certainly comprehended the taking and keeping of hearts. Now he came to think of it, he must confess that he had never loved Lucy as he did now until he had observed that so redoubtable a champion was in the lists against him. Odd thing! He had been jealous of Francis Lingen, as he now was of Urquhart; but it was the latter jealousy which had made him desire Lucy.The former had simply disgusted him, the latter had spurred him to rivalry—and now to main desire. James was no philosopher; he had an idle mind except in the conduct of his business. He could not attempt, then, to explain his state of mind—but he was very much interested. Soon he saw her in the dusk under the pines: a slim white shape, standing with one hand upon the trunk of a tree. Her back was towards him; she did not turn.
She supposed that it was Urquhart come back, and was careful not to seem waiting for him. "How quick you have been!" she said lightly, and stood where she was. No answer was returned. Then came a shock indeed, and her head seemed to flood with fear. Two hands from behind her covered her eyes; her head was drawn gently back, and she was kissed ardently on the lips. She struggled wildly; she broke away. "Oh!" she said, half sobbing. "Oh, how cruel you are—how cruel! How could you dare to do it?" And then, free of the hands, she turned upon Urquhart—and saw James. "Oh, my love!" she said, and ran to him and broke into tears.
James had secured his eyeglass, but now let it drop. He allowed her to cry her fill, and thenmade the best of a rather bad business. "If every man who kissed his wife," said he, "was answered like that, lips would go dry."
She said through her tears, "You see, I thought you were Mr. Urquhart with my wrap."
"Oh, the dickens you did," said James. "And is that how Mr. Urquhart usually brings you a wrap?"
She clung to him. "Well, no. If he did, I suppose I shouldn't have been so angry—by this time."
"That's a very good answer," James allowed. "I'll only make one comment upon it. You cried out upon the cruelty of the attack. Now if it had been—assume it for the moment—our—well, friend, let us say, why would it have been cruel of him? Shameful, flagrant, audacious, impudent, insolent, all that I can understand. But cruel, Lucy?"
Lucy's cheek was upon his shoulder, and she let it stay there, even while she answered. The moment was serious. She must tell him as much as she dared. Certain things seemed out of the question; but something she must tell him.
"You see, James," she said, "I think Mr. Urquhart is fond of me—in fact, I'm sure of it—"
"Has he told you so?"
"Not in so many words—but—"
"But in so many other words, eh? Well, pursue."
"And I told him that I couldn't possibly join the party—on that account."
"Did you tell him it was on that account?"
"No," said Lucy, "I didn't; but he understood that. I know he understood it, because he immediately said that if I would come I shouldn't repent it. And I haven't. He has never made me feel uncomfortable. But just now—when I was expecting him—oh, it seemed to me quite horrible—and I was furious with him."
"You were indeed. It didn't occur to you that it might have been—well, somebody with more right."
Her arm tightened, but she said nothing. The unconscious James went on. "I was wrong. A man has no right to kiss a woman unawares—in the dark. Even if it's his wife. She'll always want to know who it was, and she's bound to find out. And he'll get no thanks for it, either." Then it became necessary for Lucy to thank him.
"Mind you, my dear," he told her. "I have no quarrel with Jimmy Urquhart up to now. Yousay he's in love with you, and I think that he is. I've thought so for some time, and I confess that I didn't relish the idea that he should be out here with us. But since we are in for confessions I'll make one more. If he hadn't been in love with you I don't believe that I should be—as I am now."
Lucy laughed—the laugh of a woman rich. "Then I'm very much obliged to him," she said.
But Urquhart was harder to convince than James.
Vera Nugent, a brisk woman of the world, with a fondness for vivid clothing and a Spanish air which went oddly with it, took the trouble one fine day to tackle her brother. "Look here, Jimmy," she said as they breasted a mountain pass, "are you quite sure what you are up to with these people?"
Urquhart's eyes took a chill tinge—a hard and pebbly stare. "I don't know what you mean," he said.
"Men always say that, especially when they know very well. Of course I mean the Macartneys. You didn't suppose I was thinking of the Poplolly?" The Poplolly, I regret to say, was Francis Lingen, whom Vera abhorred. The term was opprobrious, and inexact.
But Urquhart shrouded himself in ice. "Perhaps you might explain yourself," he said.
Vera was not at all sure that she would. "You make it almost impossible, you know."
They were all out in a party, and were to meet the luncheon and the boys, who had gone round in the boat. As parties will have it, they had soon scattered. Lingen had taken Margery Dacre to himself, Lucy was with her husband. Urquhart, now he came to think of it, began to understand that the sceptre was out of his hands. The pass, worn out of the shelving rock by centuries of foot-work, wound itself about the breasting cliffs like a scarf; below them lay the silver fiord, and upon that, a mere speck, they could see the motor-boat, with a wake widening out behind her like parallel lines of railway.
Urquhart saw in his mind that he would be a fool to quarrel with Vera. She was not on his side, he could feel; but he didn't despair of her. One way of putting her off him forever was to allow her to think him a fool. That he could not afford.
"Don't turn against me for a mannerism, my dear," he said.
"I turn against you, if at all, for a lack of mannerism," said Vera briskly. "It's too bad of you. Here I am as so much ballast for your party, and when I begin to make myself useful, you pretend I'm not there. But Iamthere, you know."
"I was cross," he said, "because I'm rather worried, and I thought you were going to worry me more."
"Well, maybe that I am,"—she admitted that. "But I don't like to see a sharp-faced man make a donkey of himself. The credit of the family is at stake."
He laughed. "I wouldn't be the first of us—and this wouldn't be the first time. There's whimsy in the blood. Well—out with it. Let me know the worst."
Vera stopped. "I intend to do it sitting. We've heaps of time. None of the others want us."
Urquhart hit the rock with his staff. "That's the point, my child. Do they—or don't they?"
"You believe," Vera said, "that Lucy is in love with you."
Urquhart replied, "I know that she was."
"There you have the pull over me," she answered. "I haven't either your confidence or hers. All I can tell you is that now she isn't." Urquhart was all attention. "Do you mean, she has told you anything?"
"Good Heavens," Vera scoffed, "what do you take me for? Do you think I don't know by thelooks of her? If you weren't infatuated you'd know better than I do."
"My dear girl," Urquhart said, with a straight look at her, "the fact is, I am infatuated."
"I'm sorry for you. You've made a mess of it. But I must say that I'm not at all sorry for her. Don't you suppose that she is the sort to find the world well lost for yourbeaux yeux. Far from that. She'd wilt like a rose in a window-box."
"I'd take her into fairy-land," said Urquhart. "She should walk in the dawn. She wouldn't feel her feet."
"She would if they were damp," said Vera, who could be as direct as you please. "If you think she's a wood nymph in a cage, you're very much mistaken. She's very domestic."
"I know," said the infatuate, "that I touched her." Vera tossed her head.
"I'll be bound you did. You aren't the first man to light a fire. That's what you did. You lit a fire for Macartney to warm his hand at. She's awfully in love with him."
Urquhart grew red. "That's not probable," he said.
Vera said, "It's certain. Perhaps you'll takethe trouble to satisfy yourself before you take tickets for fairy-land. It's an expensive journey, I believe. Had you thought what you would be doing about Lancelot—a very nice boy?"
"No details had been arranged," said Urquhart, in his very annoying way.
"Not even that of the lady's inclinations, it appears. Well, I've warned you. I've done it with the best intentions. I suppose even you won't deny that I'm single-minded? I'm not on the side of your solicitor." That made Urquhart very angry.
"I'm much obliged to you, my dear. We'll leave my solicitor out of account for the moment." But that nettled Vera, who flamed.
"Upon my word, Jimmy, you are too sublime. You can't dispose of people quite like that. How are you to leave him out of account, when you brought his wife into it? If you ever supposed that Macartney was nothing but a solicitor, you were never more mistaken in your life—except when you thought that Lucy was a possible law-breaker."
At the moment, and from where they stood, the sea-scape and the coast-road stood revealed before and behind them for many a league. In front itdescended by sharp spirals to a river-bed. Vera Nugent standing there, her chin upon her hands, her hands upon her staff, could see straight below her feet two absorbed couples, as it were on different grades of the scene. In the first the fair Margery Dacre leaned against a rock while Lingen, on his knees, tied her shoestring; at a lower level yet Macartney, having handed his Lucy over a torrent, stooped his head to receive his tribute. Vera, who had a grain of pity in her, hoped that Urquhart had been spared; but whether he was or not she never knew. No signs of disturbance were upon him at the ensuing picnic, unless his treatment of Macartney—with a kind of humorous savagery—betrayed him. They talked of the Folgefond, that mighty snow-field beyond the fiord which the three men intended to traverse in a day or two's time.
"Brace yourself, my friend," Urquhart said. "Hearts have been broken on that ground before now."
James said that he had made his peace with God—but Lucy looked full-eyed and serious.
"I never know when you are laughing at us," she said to Urquhart.
"Be sure that I have never laughed at you in my life," he said across the table-cloth.
"He laughs at me," said James behind his eyeglass; "but I defy him. The man who can laugh at himself is the man I envy. Now I never could do that."
"You've hit me in a vital spot," Urquhart said. "That's my little weakness; and that's why I've never succeeded in anything—even in breaking my neck."
Lancelot nudged his friend Patrick. "Do you twig that?"
Patrick blinked, having his mouth too full to nod conveniently.
"Can't drive a motor, I suppose! Can't fly—I don't think."
"As to breaking your neck," said James, "there's still a chance for you."
"I shall make a mess of it," Urquhart retorted.
"Is this going to be a neck-breaking expedition?" That was from Lingen, who now had an object in life.
"I never said so," Urquhart told him. "I said heart-breaking—a far simpler affair."
"What is going to break your heart in it,please?" Lucy asked him. She saw that there lay something behind his rattle.
"Well," said Urquhart, brazening it out, "it would break mine to get over the snow-field—some eight miles of it, there are—and to find that I couldn't get down. That might easily happen."
"And what would you do?"
James fixed her with his eyeglass. "That's where the neck-breaking might intervene," he said. "Jimmy would rather risk his neck any day."
"Than his heart!"
"Heart!" said Vera. "No such thing. Quite another organ. It's a case of dinner. He'd risk his neck for a dinner, and so would any man."
"I believe you are right," said James.
Lucy with very bright eyes looked from one to the other of her lovers. Each wore a mask. She determined to ask James to give up the Folgefond, discerning trouble in the air.
They went home by water, and Lancelot added his unconscious testimony. He was between Urquhart's knees, his hand upon the tiller, his mood confidential.
"I say—" he began, and Urquhart encouraged him to say on.
—"It's slightly important, but I suppose I couldn't do the Folgefond by any chance?"
"You are saying a good deal," said Urquhart. "I'll put it like this, that by some chance you might, but by no chance in the world could Patrick."
"Hoo!" said Lancelot, "and why not, pray?"
"His mother would put her foot on it. Splosh! it would go like a cockroach."
"I know," said dreamy Lancelot. "That's what would happen to me, I expect." Then he added, "That's what will happen to my father."
"Good cockroach," said Urquhart, looking ahead of him. "You think she won't want him to go."
Lancelot snorted. "Won'twant him! Why, she doesn't already. And he'll do what she wants, I'll bet you."
"Does he always?"
"He always does now. It's the air, I fancy."
But pout as she might, she could not prevail with James, whose vanity had been scratched.
"My dear girl, I'd sooner perish," he said. "Give up a jolly walk because Jimmy Urquhart talks about my heart and his own neck—preposterous! Besides, there's nothing in it."
"But, James," she said, "if I ask you—"
He kissed the back of her neck. She was before the glass, busy with her hair. "You don't ask me. You wouldn't ask me. No woman wants to make a fool of a man. If she does, she's a vampire."
"Mr. Urquhart is very impulsive," she dared to say.
"I've known that for a long time," said James. "Longer than you have, I fancy. But it takes more than impulse to break another man's neck. Besides, I really have no reason to suppose that he wants to break my neck. Why should he?"
Here they were up against the wall again. If there were reasons, he could not know them. There was no getting over it yet. They were to start betimes in the morning, and sleep that night at Brattebö, which is the hithermost spur of the chain. Dinner and beds had been ordered at Odde, beyond the snow-field.
Dinner was a gay affair. They toasted the now declared lovers. True to his cornering instincts, Lingen had told Lucy all about it in the afternoon. "Your sympathy means so much to me—and Margery, whose mind is exquisitely sensitive, is only waiting your nod to be at your feet, with me."
"I should be very sorry to see either of you there," Lucy said. "I'm very fond of her and I shouldn't take it at all kindly if she demeaned herself. When do you think of marrying?"
He looked at her appealingly. "I must have time," he said; "time to build the nest."
"A flat, I suppose," she said, declining such poetical flights.
"A flat!" said Francis Lingen. "Really, it hadn't occurred to me."
From Lucy the news went abroad, and so the dinner was gay. Urquhart confined himself tothe two boys, and told them about the Folgefond—of its unknown depth, of the crevasses, of the glacier on its western edge, of certain white snakes, bred by the snow, which might be found there. Their bite was death, he said.
"Frost-bite," said Patrick Nugent, who knew his uncle's way; but Lancelot favoured his mother.
"Hoo!" he said. "I expect that you'd give him what for. One blow of your sword and his head would lie at your feet."
"That's nasty, too," said Urquhart. "They have white blood, I believe." Lancelot blinked.
"Beastly," he said. "Did Mamma hear you? You'd better not tell her. She hates whiteness. Secretly—so do I, rather."
It was afterwards, when the boys had gone to bed, that a seriousness fell upon those of them who were given to seriousness. James and Vera Nugent settled down squarely to piquet. Francis Lingen murmured to his affianced bride.
"I don't disguise from myself—and from you I can have no secrets—that there is danger in the walk. The snow is very treacherous at this season. We take ropes, of course. Urquhart is said to know the place; but Urquhart is—"
"He's very fascinating," said Margery Dacre, and Francis lifted his eyebrows.
"You find that? Then I am distressed. I would share everything with you if I could. To me, I don't know why, there is something crude—some harsh note—a clangour of metal. I find him brazen—at times. But to you, my love, who could be strident? You are the very home of peace. When I think of you I think of doves in a nest."
"You must think of me to-morrow, then," said Margery. He rewarded her with a look.
Lucy, for her part, had another sort of danger in her mind. It seemed absolutely necessary to her now to speak to Urquhart, because she had a conviction that he and James had very nearly come to grips. Women are very sharp at these things. She was certain that Urquhart knew the state of her heart, just as certain as if she had told him of it. That being so, she dreaded his impulse. She suspected him of savagery, and as she had no pride where love was concerned she intended to appeal to him. Modesty she had, but no pride. She must leave great blanks in her discourse; but she trusted him to fill them up. Thenthere was another difficulty. She had no remains of tenderness left for him: not a filament. Unless she went warily he might find that out and be mortally offended. All this she battled with while the good-nights to Lancelot were saying upstairs. She kissed his forehead, and stood over him for a moment while he snuggled into his blankets. "Oh, my lamb, you are worth fighting for!" was her last thought, as she went downstairs full of her purpose.
The card-players sat in the recess; the lovers were outside. Urquhart was by himself on a divan. She thought that he was waiting for her.
With a book for shield against the lamp she took the chair he offered her. "Aren't they extraordinary?" she said. He questioned.
"Who is extraordinary? Do you mean the card-sharpers? Not at all. It's meat and drink to them. It's we who are out of the common: daintier feeders."
"No," she said, "it's not quite that. James's strong point is that he can keep his feelings in separate pigeonholes. I'm simply quaking with fear, because my imagination has flooded me. But he won't think about the risks he's running—until he is running them."
Urquhart had been looking at her until he discovered that James had his eye upon her too. He crossed his leg and clasped the knee of it; he looked fixedly at the ceiling as he spoke.
"I should like to know what it is you're afraid of," he said in a carefully literal but carefully inaudible tone. He did that sort of thing very well.
Lucy was pinching her lip. "All sorts of things," she said. "I suffer from presentiments. I think that you or James may be hurt, for instance—"
"Do you mean," said Urquhart—as if he had been saying "Where did you get this tobacco?"—"Do you mean that you're afraid we may hurt each other?"
She hung her head deeply.
"You needn't be. If you can fear that you must forget my promise." He saw her eyes clear, then cloud again before her difficulties.
"James, at least," she said, "has never done you any harm." It was awfully true. But it annoyed him. Damn James!
"None whatever," he answered sharply. "I wonder if I haven't done him any good."
Looking at her guardedly, through half-closedeyes, he saw that she was strongly moved. Her bosom rose and fell hastily, like short waves lipping a wharf. Her hands were shut tight. "You have been the best friend I ever had," she said. "Don't think I'm not grateful."
That came better. He tapped his pipe on the ash-tray at hand. "My dear," he said, "I intend to live on your gratitude. Don't be afraid of anything.Lascia fare a me." She rewarded him with a shy look. A rueful look, it cut him like a knife; but he could have screwed it round in the wound to get more of such pain. There's no more bitter-sweet torment to a man than the thanks of the beloved woman for her freedom given back to her.
He felt very sick indeed—but almost entirely with himself. For her he chose to have pity; of Macartney he would not allow himself to think at all. Danger lay that way, and he did not intend to be dangerous. He would not even remember that he was subject to whims. The thought flitted over his mind, like an angel of death, but he dismissed it with an effort. After all, what good could come of freebooting? The game was up. Like all men of his stamp, he cast about him far and wide for a line of action; fordirectly the Folgefond walk was over he would be off. To stay here was intolerable—just as to back out of the walk would be ignominious. No, he would go through with that somehow; but from Odde, he thought, he might send for his things and clear out. It did not occur to him that he might have to deal with Macartney. What should Macartney want that he had not? He had vindicated the law!
But the hour was come when Macartney was to know everything. Lucy was adorable, and he simply adored her; then in the melting mood which follows she sobbed and whispered her broken confession. He had the whole story from the beginning.
He listened and learned; he was confounded, he was deeply touched. He might have been humiliated, and so frozen; he might have been offended, and so bitter; but he was neither. Her tears, her sobs, her clinging, her burning cheeks, the flood of her words, or the sudden ebb which left her speechless—all this taught him what he might be to a woman who dared give him so much. He said very little himself, and exacted the last dregs from her cup. He drank it down like a thirsty horse. Probably it was as sweet for himto drink as for her to pour; for love is a strange affair and can be its own poison and antidote.
At the end he forgot his magnanimity, so great was his need of hers. "You have opened my eyes to my own fatuity. You have made me what I never thought I could be. I am your lover—do you know that? And I have been your husband for how long? Your husband, Lucy, and now your lover. Never let these things trouble you any more."
She clung to him with passion. "I love you," she said. "I adore you. If I've been wicked, it was to prove you good to me, and to crush me to the earth. Love me again—I am yours forever."
Later she was able to talk freely to him, as of a thing past and done. "It's very odd; I can't understand it. You didn't begin to love me until he did, and then you loved me for what he saw in me. Isn't that true?"
"I couldn't tell you," he said, "because I don't know what he did see."
"He thought I was pretty—"
"So you are—"
"He thought that I liked to be noticed—"
"Well, and you do—"
"Of course. But it never struck you."
"No—fool that I was."
"I love you for your foolishness."
"Yes, but you didn't."
"No," she said quickly. "No! because you wouldn't allow it. You must let women love before you can expect them to be meek."
He laughed. "Do you intend to be meek?"
Then it was her turn to laugh. "I should think I did! That's my pride and joy. You may do what you like now."
He found that a hard saying; but it is a very true one.
The departure was made early. Lucy came down to breakfast, and the boys; but Margery Dacre did not appear. Vera of course did not. Noon was her time. The boys were to cross the fiord with them and return in the boat. Lucy would not go, seeing what was the matter with Urquhart.
Urquhart indeed was in a parlous frame of mind. He was very grim to all but the boys. He was to them what he had always been. Polite and very quiet in his ways with Lucy, he had noword for either of his companions. James treated him with deference; Francis Lingen, who felt himself despised, was depressed.
"Jolly party!" said Lancelot, really meaning it, and made Urquhart laugh. But Lucy shuddered at such a laugh. She thought of the wolves in the Zoological Gardens when at sundown they greet the night. It made her blood feel cold in her veins.
"If no one's going to enjoy himself, why does anybody go?" she said at a venture. James protested that he was going to enjoy himself prodigiously. As for Lingen, he said, it would do him no end of good.
"I jolly well wish I could go," was Lancelot's fishing shot, and Lucy, who was really sorry for Urquhart, was tempted to urge it. But James would not have heard of such a thing, she knew.
Then they went, with a great deal of fuss and bustle. James, a great stickler for the conventions, patted her shoulder for all good-bye. Urquhart waited his chance.
"Good-bye, my dear," he said. "I've had my innings here. You won't see me again, I expect. I ask your pardon for many things—but I believe that we are pretty well quits. Trust mewith your James, won't you? Good-bye." He asked her that to secure himself against whims.
She could do no more than give him her hand. He kissed it, and left her. The boat was pushed out. Urquhart took the helm, with Lancelot in the crook of his arm. He turned once and waved his cap.
"There goes a man any woman could love," she told herself. If she had a regret she had it not long. "Some natural tears they shed, but dried them soon."
They made a good landing, bestowed their gear in a cart, and set out for a long climb to Brattebö, which they reached in the late afternoon—a lonely farm on the side of a naked hill. They slept there, and were to rise at four for the snow-field.