“A parable,” said Miles.
His voice rose no higher; for both were suddenly a little awed, as though their spirits had caught some rushing echo of that broader flood, the irrevocable and universal. And now some influence as wide, something neither gradual nor swift, closed about them powerfully. They had leaned forward, shoulder to shoulder, over the brown pool; but at this mystical, blind accession, each felt the other tremble and draw back.
A kingfisher chattered angrily, away in the upper reaches. It was the recurring silence, however, that alarmed. Of all their silences, this seemed as it were the end, the turning, and the explication. But still it endured, throbbing with a perilous energy.
Slowly, in a kind of sleep-waking effort, the girl got upon her feet.
“Come,” she said. Her face, in the alder shadows, was very pale. A shiver of light from the brook played golden about her throat, like the reflected glow of buttercups in the children’s game.
“Come,” she repeated. “We can’t—we must get home.”
Moved by the helplessness of that command, he followed. They crossed the sunset pastures almost without word or look, like pilgrims crossing the Debatable Ground. And when they had climbed the last hill, and come racing steeply down toward the river and the house, she went straight to the shelter of Ella’s kitchen.
He did not see her alone again till that evening. Meanwhile he had walked the shore, raging at himself for what had passed, put almost beside his reason at thought of what might come. After blindness, it was an aching sight that disclosed how their friendship—so wholesome, firm, and precious—could change at a breath, and in the most tranquil moment of security could totter above unknown deeps. Was he then worse than Tony, and their house no better than the drunkard’s? This girl had fled to him; she had taken his promises, was here upon his honor; and now, because he had willfully drifted down a pleasant way, they had reached such a pass that—He closed the thought with a groan. By some detestable trick, he foresaw, their very speech could no longer be free and honest.
She made no offer, that evening, to go down with him to the lamps; and he was rather glad of the fact than sorry at its cause. To walk alone from tower to tower, through the cool firs and cedars, proved a respite. Yet when he faced the hill to return, trepidation seized him afresh. He climbed toward the house, vexed and wondering; and for the second time in all his memory, was afraid to enter.
She sat behind the candle-flame, a great book flattened wide on the table, and her head bent over it as for dear life. All the brightness in the room had gathered in this corner, and at first he dared not go near. But it was now or never with his play-acting; and so, choosing a book at random, he sat down opposite her resolutely, to begin the pretense that all things remained as before.