"And how quickly it sizzled and went out when it had to?" she laughed.
Impulsively he took her hand—a hand which she did not withdraw, for she was trembling. Slowly his face bent nearer her own, his words were sunk to a whisper, but in his eyes there gleamed the craving of her lips.
"Don't!" she protested, raising her free hand—"for God's sake don't! You shall not!"
"I must," he answered, hotly.
"You shall not," she replied. "I should only suffer—I am unhappy enough as it is," and she buried her face in her clenched hands, her shoulders quivering.
Even the quiver did not evade the eyes of the man stock still beside the hemlock; no detail of the drama that was being enacted beside the brook escaped him. He who could observe with ease the smashing of a moth's wing thirty rods from shore, possessed a clearness of vision akin to that of a hawk. A bird fluttered in the underbrush near them.
"What was that?" she asked, with a guilty little start, withdrawing her hand.
"A bird—nothing more dangerous," he laughed outright, amused at her fright.
Holcomb's features, as he gazed at them, were like bronze. His first thought, as he gazed out from his ambush, had been Margaret's mother! His second thought was his dislike for Sperry. He watched half unwillingly, with a feeling of mingled curiosity and disgust. He had not pried upon them; it was pure chance that had brought him where he was. At length he withdrew.
He was still thinking of the incident when he heard the brush crack ahead of him. Then the smug face of Blakeman emerged from a thicket. It was the butler's afternoon off, and he was out after birds. He let down the hammers of his gun as Holcomb drew near.