"I do wish you might stay this evening, but—well, 'tis a——" she sighed in some private trouble or exasperation, moving her hands vaguely—"one of those occasions."
Dimly frightened and not intending his own words, Ben asked: "Someone important?"
Faith made a wry face. "He would think so." Her hands sketched a wig on her head, and she strutted a little in mimicry of self-importance. "A man of substance, la. A little wintry in years to be sure. A merchant, a pillar of the church, and a—widower."
"I see...."
"Take care," she said with what might be a show of real anger, "that you do not see too much. He is a good man—I am sorry I was so naughty and forward as to make light of him. Good day, Mr. Cory!" Then in a lightning change at sight of his stricken face, Faith hurried to him and framed his face in her hands and whispered: "Did I not make you promise to come back? Oh, make your voyages—if you must. Make them for me, Ben, and forgive my cruelty!"
"You——"
Lightly and quickly, Faith kissed his lips. "Queer little scar," she said, and touched it with a finger tip, breathing hard. "Tell me of it some time. Why, I—Benjamin Cory, I would wait for you a thousand years." And she ran away across the garden, vanished utterly, in some place where Ben supposed there would be a door to safety.
He passed through the gate in a golden haze. Molly was restless. She meant no disrespect, but sometimes found it humorous to fidget and dance ponderously at the moment he was lifting his foot for the stirrup. She did so now, perhaps in comment at the obvious remoteness of Ben's mortal mind. It had the effect of drawing him back to the present world, a few mild expletives quivering on the edge of utterance, when the brown girl Clarissa, returning from some bit of marketing with a parcel under her arm, observed his difficulty, set the parcel on the steps and came to him. "May I hold her for you, sir?"
"Oh, thanks!" Ben smiled without knowing it, and mounted easily as she competently held the bridle and stroked Molly's friendly repentant nose. He was in the saddle, but her hand remained there a moment longer, and her look held him, a look profounder than a touch, demanding nothing, declaring nothing except some kind of understanding which (until he thought about it later) seemed to Ben quite natural. As if they, the two of them alone, understood and recognized certain things that concerned no one else, that no one else had ever guessed.
Clarissa spoke also, quietly, looking up at him in the sun with no smile: "Good fortune, wherever you go."