“Weren’t you? I sometimes think that you must have been. You look at her sometimes—as though she pleased you.”
Crowdie laughed, a low, golden laugh, and glanced at his picture again, but said nothing. Then, in the silence, he went and put away his paints and brushes behind the curtain on one side of the fireplace at the other end of the great room. Hester lay back among the cushions and watched him till he disappeared, and kept her eyes upon the curtain until he came out again. She watched him as a wild animal watches her mate when she fears that he is going to leave her, with earnest, glistening eyes.
But he came back, bringing with him a small Japanese vase of that rare old bronze that rings under the touch like far-off chimes. He set it down upon the tiles before the fireplace, and poured something into it, and set fire to the liquid with a match. It blazed with a misty blue flame, and he threw a few grains of something upon it. A soft, white smoke rose in little clouds, and an intoxicating perfume filled the air.
Hester’s delicate nostrils quivered, as she lay back amongst her cushions. She delighted in rare perfumes which could be burned. The faint colour rose in her pale cheeks, and her eyelids drooped. Crowdie drove the white smoke with his hands, wafting it towards her.
“What a strange question that was of yours,” he said, suddenly, seating himself upon the edge of the divan, and touching the back of her hand softly with the tips of his fingers.
She withdrew her hand and laid it upon his as soon as he had spoken, caressing his in her turn.
“Was it?” she asked, in a dreamy voice. “It seemed so natural. I couldn’t help asking you. After all, there are days when she’s very beautiful. But that wasn’t it, exactly. It was something—oh, Walter! why did you sing to her the other night? You know you promised that you’d never sing if I wasn’t there. It hurt me—it hurt me all over when I heard of it. Why did you do it? And then, why didn’t you tell me?”
“And who did tell you?” asked Crowdie, gently, but his eyelids contracted with curiosity as he asked the question. “Not Griggs?”
“Oh, no! Mamma told me, yesterday. Why did you do it? And she said dreadfully hard things to me about trying to keep you all to myself, and locking up what gives people so much pleasure—and all that.”
“I’m sorry she told you. Why will people interfere and tell tales?”