"Emily," he said, "tell me that you understand."
For a moment she gazed down on him in silence. Then, as he raised his eyes, she kissed him so softly that it seemed as if a spirit had touched his lips.
"I understand—forever," she answered.
At her words he straightened himself, as though a burden had fallen from him, and turning slowly away he went out of the house and back in the direction of Tappahannock.
CHAPTER III
Alice's Marriage
IT was after ten o'clock when he returned to Botetourt, and he found upon reaching home that Lydia had already gone to bed, though a bottle of cough syrup, placed conspicuously upon his bureau, bore mute witness to the continuance of her solicitude. After so marked a consideration it seemed to him only decent that he should swallow a portion of the liquid; and he was in the act of filling the tablespoon she had left, when a ring at the door caused him to start until the medicine spilled from his hand. A moment later the ring was repeated more violently, and as he was aware that the servants had already left the house, he threw on his coat, and lighting a candle, went hurriedly out into the hall and down the dark staircase. The sound of a hand beating on the panels of the door quickened his steps almost into a run, and he was hardly surprised, when he had withdrawn the bolts, to find Alice's face looking at him from the darkness outside. She was pale and thin, he saw at the first glance, and there was an angry look in her eyes, which appeared unnaturally large in their violent circles.
"I thought you would never open to me, papa," she said fretfully as she crossed the threshold. "Oh, I am so glad to see you again! Feel how cold my hands are, I am half frozen."
Taking her into his arms, he kissed her face passionately as it rested for an instant against his shoulder.
"Are you alone, Alice? Where is your husband?"
Without answering, she raised her head, shivering slightly, and then turning away, entered the library where a log fire was smouldering to ashes. As he threw on more wood, she came over to the hearth, and stretched out her hands to the warmth with a nervous gesture. Then the flame shot up and he saw that her beauty had gained rather than lost by the change in her features. She appeared taller, slenderer, more distinguished, and the vivid black and white of her colouring was intensified by the perfect simplicity of the light cloth gown and dark furs she wore.