“Not that I should mind some people’s talking sentiment,” he said with a smile.
She raised her laughing gaze to his, and, as their eyes met, the meaning of the look in his was too plain to be mistaken. She flushed and paled, dropping her gaze from his.
“And did nothing especial happen on the voyage?” she asked, with a strong effort to regain her careless manner.
“Not that I recall,” he answered, putting his hand beside hers upon the rustic table so that their fingers almost touched.
A moment of silence followed, broken only by the chirping of a few belated crickets, that, despite the advancement of the season, had not yet discontinued their autumnal concerts. The two, so quiet outwardly, sat with beating hearts, when suddenly a wandering breeze brought into the summer-house a puff of smoke from the burning salt meadows. It was laden with the fetid odor of consuming animal matter, and so powerful was it that both involuntarily turned away their heads.
“Bah!” Columbine cried. “How horrible! There must be a dead animal of some sort there that the fire has reached.”
She stopped speaking and gazed with surprise at Tom, who had buried his face in his hands with a groan.
“What is it? Has it made you ill? It is gone now.”
He lifted a face white with emotion.
“No,” he said, “it has not made me ill,—physically, that is; but it has done worse, it has made me remember.”