“—except poor Gurney, who paid the forfeit of his life for running after Trixie Denver anyhow. How matters stood between them one doesn’t know, but the girl is behaving as if she were his fiancée at least—if not his widow! She goes about in deep mourning——”
Leoline put the letter on one side to read presently, raised her eyes as she came out on to the stoep, and saw Evelyn Gregory.
The sun was setting behind Vohitra, but the house faced north-east, and the late long beams still struck that side of the stoep where they met. Their faces were in the shadow, the dusty light only bathing them warmly to the waist, and she saw that there was some strong purpose in his seeking her here even as she met his eyes. For a minute she seemed to wait between one life and another before he spoke—the old theoretical life of her untried girlhood, dear with the bright things of the world, that even her wifehood had left unaltered; and the deeper painful realities of existence that he had called into being for her. She knew, before he spoke, that a decision awaited her now, as to whether she should pass definitely from one to the other, and it seemed to her that she hardly faltered.
“I have come to you to put a choice before you,” he said, even as he took her hand and held it in his strong grip. He gave her no conventional greeting, though so much had happened since they had said good-bye in the bungalow ... the night before she got Ally’s letter. “I have very little time to spare—I must go back in an hour at most. The town is under my authority at present, and I am responsible.”
His word told her enough. “You have been recalled!” she said quietly.
“Yes; Halton has reached England,” he said significantly. “But apart from any private pulling of the strings, I expected this—perhaps. There was just a chance I might wire through, but it was unlikely. They are sending out another man.”
“From England?”
“Ultimately. From Capetown at present.”
“And you go home?”
“As things now stand—officially. But I have private information that I am to go to Central Africa again.”