There was something in his tones that stung her; a hopeful questioning as if he wished rather than dreaded this change. She looked at him reproachfully, and her blue eyes floated in tears.
"Oh, Nelson!"
The words were uttered in a very low voice, but in their quietness lay deep pathos. She moved close to his side and laid one hand on his shoulder, waiting for him to return the caress. He placed his arm lightly, and it seemed half reluctantly, about her waist. She felt the chill at her heart.
"You are changed!" she said, in a loud, clear voice, that sounded to his ear like a challenge. "You come here not to meet, but to abandon me."
Thrasher tightened his arm around her.
"Is this the way I abandon you?" he said.
She withdrew herself quietly from his arms, and fixing her eyes on his face gave him a long, sorrowful look.
The moonlight lay full on his features. His dark eyes looked into hers; a smile, half mocking, half pleasant, hung on his lip. He was a tall, handsome man, and the moonlight refined his face into remarkable beauty.
"Are you trying me, Nelson?" she said, half returning the smile. "Don't—don't—I have trouble enough without that."
"Trouble—was there ever a girl of your age without it, I wonder? Come, take my arm, and as we walk along you shall tell me what great misfortune sent you here crying and rocking yourself like an old woman turned out of doors."