The old, daft longing stole about him. Little, baffling webs were spun across his sullen will to make an end of Nita and her devilries. He reached out his arms to gather her to him—but she had stepped back and stood smiling at him in the moonlight.
“To-morrow, maybe, or the next day after,” she said—“when you’ve forgotten about ropes and sycamores.”
He watched her go. He was too heartsick even to curse her, or to follow.
“It’s always to-morrow with her,” he muttered, shivering in the breeze that whimpered down from Drumly Ghyll.
Then he leaned over the bridge, listening to the stream as it swirled in the deep pool below. The water called him. Every sob and gurgle enticed him to a death found easily. The plunge would be cold, into broth of melted snow, but after that—well, they said it was a quiet way of going out.
Yet he could not take the plunge. For ever Nita’s voice was in his ear, with its promise of “to-morrow, maybe.” She drew him from the waters. It was a lying promise, but she drew him. Reluctantly he turned his face towards Garsykes, and down the fell Nita’s song came with the breeze.
There came a man to my house,
Love me well, said he;
There came a man to my house,
Nay, said I, I’m free.