She glanced towards her hat and whip, and I understood. I realised what it would cost her to carry me back as her guest to Lukstein after all that had passed there.
I opened the door and stepped out on to the landing. A panel of moonlight was marked out upon the floor. 'Twas the only light in the passage, and the house was still as an empty cave. When I came back into the room Ilga was standing with her hat upon her head.
"And what of Lukstein?"
"A sop to Father Spaur," she said with a happy laugh, and reaching out a hand to me she blew out the candle. I guided her to the landing, and there stopped and kissed her.
"I have hungered for that," said I, "for a year and more."
"And I too," she whispered, "dear heart, and I too," and I felt her arms tighten about my neck. "Oh, how you must have hated me!" she said.
"I called you no harder name than 'la belle dame sans merci,'" said I.
We crept down the stairs a true couple of runaways. The door was secured by a wooden bar. I removed the bar, and we went out into the road. The stables lay to the right of the inn, and leaving Ilga where she stood, I crossed over to them and rapped quietly at the window. The ostler let me in, and we saddled quickly Ilga's horse and mine. I gave the fellow all of my three months' savings, and bidding him go back to his bed, brought the horses into the road.
I lifted Ilga into the saddle.
"So," she said, bending over me, and her heart looked through her eyes, "the lath was steel after all, and I only found it out when the steel cut me."