That she should prefer Sellon seemed to Renshaw quite a natural thing. In his single-heartedness, his utter freedom from egotism, he was sublimely unconscious of any advantages which he himself might possess over the other. She had rejected him unequivocally, for he had once put his fate to the test. She was therefore perfectly free to show preference for whosoever she pleased. The one consideration which caused him to feel sore at times—and he would not have been human had it been otherwise—was the consciousness that he himself was the agency through which the two had been thrown together. Many a man would have reflected rather bitterly on the strange freak of fortune which had once appointed him the preserver of his successful rival’s life. But Renshaw Fanning’s nature was too noble to entertain any such reflection. If it occurred to him, he would cast forth the idea in horror, as something beyond all words contemptible.
This being so, he had made up his mind to accept the inevitable, and had succeeded so well—outwardly, at least—as to give his tormentor some colour for the opening words of our present chapter. But he little knew Violet Avory. That insatiable little heart-breaker fully believed in eating her cake and having it, too. She was not going to let it be said that any man had given her up, least of all this one. The giving up must come from her own side.
“How glum you are, Renshaw,” she began, at last. “You have said nothing but ‘yes’ or ‘no’ ever since we left the house. And that was at least half an hour ago.”
He started guiltily. The use of his Christian name was an artfully directed red-hot shot from her battery. In public it was always “Mr Fanning.” And they had not met otherwise than in public since his return.
“Am I?” he echoed. “I really beg your pardon, but I am afraid I must be.”
“First of all, where are you going to take me?”
“We had better ride up to the head of the Long Kloof. It is only a gradual ascent, and an easier ride for you.”
This was agreed to, and presently they were winding between the forest-clad spurs of the hills; on, leisurely, at a foot’s-pace; the great rolling seas of verdure, spangled with many a fantastic-hued blossom, sweeping down to the path itself; the wild black-mouthed gorges echoing the piping call of birds in the brake, and the sullen deep-throated bark of the sentinel baboon, squatted high overhead.
But the ride, so far from doing her good, seemed, judging from results, to be exercising a still further damping effect upon Violet’s spirits. It had become her turn now to answer in monosyllables, as her companion tried to interest her in the scenery and surroundings. All of a sudden she wildly burst into tears.
Down went Renshaw’s wise resolutions, the result of a painful and severe course of self-striving, like a house of cards. The sight of her grief seemed more than he could bear.