“Yes. He said something about Miss Craven’s voice having suggested something supernatural to Brian, and then he asked me all at once if there had been any mist on the previous evening when I had rowed across the lough. Now I should like to know how he guessed that I had crossed the lough on the previous night.”
“He is clever—diabolically clever,” said Harold after a pause. “He was with Miss Craven in the hall—they had been dancing—when I returned—I noticed the way he looked at me. Was there anything in my face to tell him that—that I had met you?”
She looked at his face and laughed.
“Your face,” she said. “Your face—what could there have been apparent on your face for Mr. Airey to read?”
“What—what?” his voice was low. He was now looking into her gray eyes. “What was there upon my face? I cannot tell. Was it a sense of doom? God knows. Now that I look upon your face—even now I cannot tell whether I feel the peace of God which passes understanding, or the doom of those who go down to the sea and are lost.”
“I do not like to hear you speak in that way,” said she. “It would be better for me to die than to mean anything except what is peaceful and comforting to all of God’s creatures.”
“It would be better for you to die,” said he. He took his eyes away from hers. They stood side by side in silence for some moments, before he turned suddenly to her and said in quite a different strain. “I shall row you across the lough when you are ready. Will you go after lunch?”
“I don’t think that I shall be going quite so soon,” said she. “The fact is that Lady Innisfail was good enough to send Brian with another letter to my father—a letter from herself, asking my father to come to the Castle for a day or two, but, whether he comes or not, to allow me to remain for some days.”
Again some moments passed before Harold spoke.
“I want you to promise to let me know where you go when you leave Ireland,” said he. “I don’t want to lose sight of you. The world is large. I wandered about in it for nearly thirty years before meeting you.”