“That’s right, ma’am,” he said, soothingly; “you’d better go. I’ll open the gate——Why, dash it all, it’s locked! How did you come in?”
She vouchsafed no answer, but turned and walked up the path again. He stepped past her and guarded the door as before; and she, with an angry snarl, went down the garden and leaned on the gate. There she remained till the darkness wrapped the lonely lane.
The man spoke to her two or three times urging her to go, but she made no reply, and took no notice of him whatever. The weary hours rolled along, then suddenly a firm step was heard in the lane, the man hurried to the gate and held up the lamp, and its light fell upon Faradeane.
It shone, too, upon the woman’s face, defiant still, but now pale with some new emotion, as the black eyes flashed up at the handsome face of the man for whom she had been waiting.
He did not start, but into his grave, weary eyes came a strange look, as if the long-expected had come to pass at last.
“So I’ve found you,” she breathed. “Do you know,” she panted, “that this fellow has kept me out here—that he has treated me like a dog?”
“I beg your pardon, sir,” the man broke in. “I told the lady she mustn’t come in—she wanted to. I asked her to leave her name.”
Faradeane unlocked the gate, took the lamp from the man, and signed to him to go in; then he turned to the woman and regarded her with a dead calmness.
“Yes, you have found me,” he said, not defiantly, but in a still, steady voice. “What is it you mean to do—what is it you want?”
Her black eyes flashed up at him, and her lithe, strong hands clinched at her side.