"How is it that I have never found you before now?" Gilbert asked softly. "Were you with the Queen at Vezelay? Have you been with her on all the march?"
"Yes."
"And did you not know that I was with the army?"
"Yes; but I could not send you any word. She would not let me." The girl looked round quickly in sudden apprehension. "If she should find you here, it would be ill for you," she added, with a gesture of pushing him away.
But he showed that he would not go away.
"The Queen has always been kind to me," he said. "I am not afraid."
Beatrix would not turn to him, and was silent. He was not timid, but words did not come easily just then; therefore, manlike, he tried to draw her to him again. But she put away his hand somewhat impatiently and shook her head, whereat he felt the tingling warmth in his blood again. Then he remembered how he had felt the same thing on that night in Vezelay, when the Queen had pressed his arm unexpectedly, and once before, when she had kissed him in the tennis-court, and he was angry with himself.
"Come," she said, "let us sit down and talk. There are two years between us."
She led the way back in the direction whence he had come, and when they had reached the bank of moss she seated herself and looked out under the trees, at the blue water. He stood still a moment as though hesitating, and then sat down beside her, but not quite close to her, as he would have done in earlier years.
"Yes," he said thoughtfully, "there are two years between us. We must bridge them."