She saw the figure of Francis Sales detach itself from a little group and advance towards her. She knew what he would say. He would tell her, in that sulky way of his, how many weeks had passed since he had seen her and, to avoid hearing that remark, she at once waved a hand towards the clearing and said, “Why have you done this?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “To get money.”
“But they were my trees.”
“You never wrote,” he muttered.
She made a gesture, quickly controlled. Long ago when, in the first exultation of their love and their sense of richness, they had marked out the limits of their intercourse, so that they might keep some sort of faith with Christabel and preserve what was precious to themselves, it had been decided that they were not to meet by appointment, they were not to speak of love, no letters were to be exchanged, and though time had bent the first and second rules, the last had been kept with rigour. It was understood, but periodically she had to submit to Francis Sales’s complaint, “You never wrote.”
“So you cut down the trees,” she said half playfully.
“Why didn’t you write?”
“Oh, Francis, you know quite well.”
He was looking at the ground; he had not once looked at her since her greeting. “You go off on a holiday, enjoying yourself, while I—who did you go with?”
“With Henrietta,” Rose said softly.