“Esmeralda and I have parted!” he said. “No; don’t ask any question! Let that suffice. We have parted! Go back to the house.”
“But— Trafford!” she panted.
“Go!” he said, harshly. “Leave me alone. I can not bear to speak to any one. I will go into the house by the back way. Tell no one that you have seen me; say nothing. I can rely upon your silence?”
“You can always rely upon me, Trafford,” she said; “always!”
She would have clasped his arms with both her hands, but he pushed her from him almost roughly.
“Whatever you may know, whatever you may guess—say nothing, now nor in the future.”
“I will obey you in everything, Trafford,” she said.
Then she turned and left him.
He walked slowly through the spinny to the small door in the north of the house. It opened on to a hall from which there was a passage to his own rooms, and he gained them without being seen.
His man had gone down with some clothes to air, and Trafford undressed and had a bath. His head felt heavy, his limbs stiff from lying on the wet ground and in the cold morning air, but his brain cleared after the bath, and he was able to realize the grim fact that he had parted from Esmeralda forever.