“You don't mean to threaten, do you, Scott?”
“Oh, no. I'm going back to Hamilton. I was looking for a row, and you don't give me enough to go on.”
“Can't do it just now, old man,” said Sanderson, gently, shaking hands with him at the door. “I'll let you know when I can. In that case we 'll have it out between us.”
The manager strode off across the Hollow and down the Gorge to the valley station, and Sanderson mounted and took the road to Hagar. He passed the village about one. The red stallion thundered through the pine avenues at the foot of Windless and swept around the curve into Wyantenaug Valley, but it was not till within a few miles of Hamilton that the speedy little mare, even bothered as she was by her rider's infirmity of purpose, allowed herself to be overtaken. The road there turned away from the river and went covered with crisp autumn leaves through chestnut woods. Mignon looked up and laughed, and the two horses fell sympathetically into a walk.
“Don't you think you owe me an explanation?” asked Sanderson, in a low tone.
“Indeed, sir, I owe you nothing, not even for this ride. It was paid for,” rippled the silken voice, and stopped suddenly in a little sob. Sanderson turned quickly and bent over her.
“By the living God,” he said solemnly, “I swear I love you. What barrier is strong enough to face that?”
“It is because you do not know me, that. Listen, Joe. I have not been what you call good nor pure in the past and shall not in the future. No, hush. I know what I am and what I shall be always. If I swore by your living God that I loved you now, it would not mean that I should to-morrow, and the next day, oh, not at all. There are no deeps in me, nor what you call a faith or principle in life. Listen, Joe. That lady whose portrait I saw is your guardian angel. Look, I reverence now. To-morrow I shall mock both her and you. This that I speak now is only a mood. The wind is now one thing and then quite another, Joe. It has no centre and no soul. I am an artist, sir. I have moods but no character. Morals! I have none. They go like the whiff of the breeze. Nothing that I do lowers or lifts me. It passes through me and that is all. Do you not understand?” which indeed was hard to do, for the brown eyes were very soft and deep.
“If any one else had told me this,” said Sanderson, between his teeth, “man or woman, it would never have been said but once.”
“It is harder for you than for me, for to-morrow I shall not care and you, you will care perhaps a long time. You are fast like these hills. Listen. Now, sir, this is our last ride together. We are a cavalier and his lady. They are gallant and gay. They wear life and love and death in their hair like flowers. They smile and will not let their hearts be sad, for they say, 'It is cowardly to be sad: it is brave only to smile.' Is it not so?”