X.
For some days after her unforgettable meeting with Daunt in the woods, Margaret had not left the house. She had spent much of her time reading to Lydia. There was a never lessening sorrow in the invalid’s gaze that affected her, full as was her mind of her own thoughts, and she had been glad to sit with her to escape the slow-burning fires that haunted her in Melwin’s opaque eyes.
She had almost a fear to venture beyond the shelter of this cheerless home—a fear of what she longed for unspeakably and as unspeakably dreaded. She told herself that Daunt was gone, that he had returned to the city, that she would not see him again at Warne. And yet her inmost wish belied the thought. He had gone away believing her cruel. The memory tortured her. An instinctive modesty, as innate as her conscience, had made it impossible for her to express in words the distinction which her own sensitiveness had drawn. To think of it was an intangible agony; to voice it was to penetrate the veiled sanctuary of her woman-soul.
But the afternoon following Melwin’s outburst in the dining-room, her flagging spirits and the smell of the cropped fields drew her out of doors. She was sore with a sense of reproach at her own unthinking blunder. Since then she had not seen Melwin. She felt how awkward would be the next meeting.
The sunlight splintered against low-sailing clumps of vapor which extended to the horizon, and the chill of the air prompted her to walk briskly. She did not take the wood road, but kept to the open country, following the maple-lined footpath that boarded the rusting hedgerows. There was little promise in the drooping, despondent sky. A shiver of wind was in the tall grasses and a far whistling of a flock of marsh-birds came to her over the moist fallow.
A darting chipmunk made her turn her head, and she became conscious that a figure was close behind her. An intuitive knowledge flashed upon her that it was Daunt. A vibrant thrill shot through her limbs and she felt her cheeks heating.
“Margaret! Margaret!”
She turned her head where he stood uncovered behind her. His left wrist was bound tightly with a black band, and he carried his arm thrust between the buttons of his jacket.
“I am disabled for riding, you see,” he said, smiling. “My wrist has gone lame on me. You see I am stopping at Tenbridge, and I walked over the hill.”
The ease and naturalness of his opening disarmed her. She caught herself smiling back at him.