“Is it,” she asked, “because you still hope to win me without marriage?”
He turned upon her savagely.
“Temptress and taunter!” he exclaimed. “I know your sort. You love to feel your hideous power. You suck delight from my misery.”
He drew nearer to her and seized one of her wrists.
“I love you,” he whispered; “isn’t that enough?”
They were in a little pathway among the rushes by the lake’s side. Suddenly, she wrested herself away from him and, raising her right arm, threw the parcel she carried into the lake. It floated on the surface, and the gentle south wind moved it slowly across the water in the direction of Langaza village, a couple of miles away.
She looked at him with a mocking smile.
“Let us go back,” she said, “for this is merely the waste of another day.”
“Why have you thrown your sketching things away?” he asked, stupidly.
“I haven’t. The things I have thrown away were once yours. Then they became mine. They will belong to the person who finds them.”