Armand raised his face, grown old and haggard. On him lay the burden of her coming there; it was for him to avert, if by any means he could, so horrible a thing. They must be sent away before she came. And there was only one way of doing that. It might not be successful. That he would never know. But he had to do it; he had to do it.
He pressed his hands tightly round his head, where the whirling thoughts drove like bees, and where the remembrance of Horatia, and his courtship, and Maurice, and the consciousness of the sunshine outside, the knowledge that in an incredibly short space of time he would lie out in it and neither feel nor see it, clear and vehement in themselves, were all subordinated to a vision of Laurence coming along the forest path. He looked once more at his watch. Twenty-five minutes—not a second to lose, since they must be gone some distance before she came, and they would probably spend some time in searching his body and the hut before they left. His brain had suddenly become as clear as ice. He stood up, turned out his pockets, put his money and watch on the table, took up his pistols, which were loaded; then laid them down again. It would waste time, and be quite useless. For a moment more he stood looking round the room which had been so irradiated by the thought of her presence, where—it was his last prayer—she would never come now.
And then, since with whatever of less worthy commingled, there ran in his veins the blood of a long line that had never stayed for mortal peril, Armand de la Roche-Guyon set his teeth, and, opening the door, walked out to death.
* * * * *
The two wood pigeons on the roof, who had been frightened away by the noise of the volley, had returned, and their sleepy, liquid notes melted into the peace of the summer afternoon as Madame de Vigerie came riding in her green amazone through the wood. As the hut came into sight she dropped into a walk. At first she merely noticed, though with an instant surprise, that the door stood open.
But her horse knew, before she did, and stopped, trembling. Laurence de Vigerie gave a broken scream, and put her hands instinctively over her eyes. The next moment she had slid to the ground, and catching up the folds of her long habit, was running to him.
Armand lay face downwards on the woodland grass, about ten paces from the open door, in an attitude not wholly unlike a sleeper's. Except by one shoulder, there was little sign of blood, till, tugging at him, she had turned him over. But his head, when she raised it, fell back inert on her arm, the face uninjured, but of a mortal greyness, the half open eyes rolled upwards almost out of sight. A thin scarlet stream had trickled down from one corner of his mouth; his right hand clutched a tuft of grass. Three or four patches of wet blood on his clothes, his left sleeve, soaked from shoulder to wrist—the arm was broken and the hand shot through—and the one pool on the ground which was already crimsoning her habit, were more than enough to show her what had happened. Yet she tore off his neck-cloth and unfastened his coat and shirt before she knew, shuddering, that here was ruin beyond human repairing, And she caught the riddled body in her arms, crying to him, kissing him, while the pigeons cooed in the sun, and, to windward of the evidence of slaughter, her horse grazed reassured.
CHAPTER XXII
(1)
The brilliance of the hall at St. Clair dazzled Horatia. Someone took her gently by the arm, and led her up the great staircase into a little room full of books. Not till she got there did she realise even the sex of the person, and found that her conductor was a grey-haired man.