Could it be possible? What insanity! And yet what sweetness! He had known, then, of that infraction in their own Herb-Garden this morning! Jealousy! There is no jealousy without love ... oh, then, she could forgive him all!
She rose, drawing a deep, joyous breath, and answered the indictment as she had taken it to herself.
“And what of it, David?” said she. Trembling upon her lips was almost that surrender which it is a woman’s pride never to offer. “What of it?” And she would have added—“A woman cannot always be guardian of the outer world, however consecrated she may hold certain gardens. But so long as her heart remains inviolate, so long as that remains consecrate, what does anything else matter?” But he had quickly caught up her spoken word with a fresh outburst of frenzy.
“What of it?” he echoed. “You may well ask the question. Is it not a thing that happens every day? You are right, the man who would live in the world must close his ears to what is not meant for them; as he must shut his eyes, no matter how flagrant the treachery, that is spread out before him. And then, no doubt, he may find the world a vastly pleasant place. That is the proper doctrine. Oh, and ’tis the natural one, for we are all made cowards? I myself, when I heard, I ran from the sound. I threw myself upon the moor that evening. I thrust my fingers into my ears. I reasoned with myself against what I knew was the truth—that is what people call reason. And I said what you have said: What of it!”
There was a moment’s silence. Then his voice rang out once more:
“But I could not!” He struck his breast. “I could not. There is something here even now in this dead heart of mine that must live in me as long as the spirit is in me. The truth, the truth! I cannot lie to myself, I cannot believe in another’s lies—I had heard, I must see. I rose from the ground, it was drenched with dew. It was night. Something led me, angel or demon. There was fire-light leaping up against the window. I looked in—I saw. Oh, you woman, turn away your false, compassionate eyes, for one thing I have sworn that I will never look on a woman’s treachery again!”
“David,” cried Ellinor again, “remember that I am of your blood!”
“Aye, of my blood. The mockery of fate is complete: betrayed by friendship, betrayed by love, betrayed by my own blood——!”
“David!”
“Yes—Maud, my sister, that is my own blood, is it not? Maud laughed, oh, she laughed! She came and sat by the side of my bed, the wound that Lochore’s bullet had made was yet green in my lung—for the memory of our old friendship he could not even do me the mercy to shoot straight—and she, my own sister ... my blood! She was to marry the man whose hand was red and whose soul was black, the man who had openly flaunted about Town, as the latest Corinthian, the girl that was to have been his friend’s bride, and boasted that he had done me what he called the best service one man could do another. ‘Why, fool, you owe him eternal gratitude,’ said Maud. It was a huge joke!”