He had nearly reached the further end when a sudden fragrance swept across his path—pure, intoxicating, exquisitely sweet. Violets! The violets that grew in the great bed under the study-window! The violets that Sir Beverley's bride had planted fifty years ago!
The thought of his grandfather went through him like a stab through the heart. He clenched his hands and held his breath while the spasm passed. Never since the night Victor had summoned Avery to comfort him, had he felt so sick a longing for the old man's presence. For a few lingering seconds it was almost more than he could bear. Then he turned about and faced the chill night-wind and that lighted window, and the anguish of his vigil drove out all other griefs. How long had he yet to wait? How long? How long?
There came a low call behind him on the terrace. He wheeled, strangling a startled exclamation in his throat. A man's figure—a broad, powerful figure—lounged towards him. He seemed to be wearing carpet slippers, for he made no sound. It was Maxwell Wyndham, and Piers' heart ceased to beat. He stood as if turned to stone. All the blood in his body seemed to be singing in his ears. His head was burning, the rest of him cold—cold as ice. He would have moved to meet the advancing figure, but he could not stir. He could only stop and listen to that maddening tarantella beating out in his fevered brain.
"I say, you know—" the voice came to him out of an immensity of space, as though uttered from another world—"it's a bit too chilly for this sort of thing. Why didn't you put on an overcoat?"
A man's hand, strong and purposeful, closed upon his arm and impelled him towards the house.
Piers went like an automaton, but he could not utter a word. His mouth felt parched, his tongue powerless.
Avery! Avery! The woman he had wronged—the woman he worshipped so madly—for whom his whole being mental and physical craved desperately, yearning, unceasingly,—without whom he lived in a torture that was never dormant! Avery! Avery! Was she lying dead behind that lighted window? If so, if so, those six months of torment had been in vain. He would end his misery swiftly and finally before it turned his brain.
Maxwell Wyndham was guiding him towards the conservatory where a dim light shone. It was like an altar-flame in the darkness—that place where first their lips had met. The memory of that night went through him like a sword-thrust. Oh, Avery! Oh, Avery!
"Now look here," said Maxwell Wyndham, in his steady, emotionless voice; "you're wanted upstairs, but you can't go unless you are absolutely sure of yourself."
Wanted! His senses leapt to the word. Instinctively he pulled himself together, collecting all his strength. He spoke, and found to his surprise that speech was not difficult.