And though remembering it as he had seen it, with the desolation of years over it all, it all looked unfamiliar to him now and yet wonderfully, strangely familiar.
Then suddenly there came to him with a sense of shock and anxiety a question. What of the little stone nymph who had stood there in the midst of the pool? Had they torn her from her pedestal and banished her from the place she had held for centuries? Why had he never spoken of her? Why had he never asked that she might be protected? Why—why above all did he care? What had become of a little stone image with a broken arm and a battered vase, and the slender little stone body all stained green?
But he did care, and he wanted to know what her fate was. He turned back into the room and saw his wife sleeping there. The sunlight slanted in through the uncurtained window and touched her face, and he stood looking at her.
Sleeping, she seemed, in spite of her eight and twenty years, to be such a child. There was a smile on her lips, her face was pillowed on one white bare arm, her hair fell about her on the pillow.
He stretched out his hand and lifted one heavy lock and held it lightly, letting it slip softly through his fingers till it fell to the pillow again.
And, watching her as she slept, he wondered why his heart did not throb, why a great passionate love for her did not come—yet it did not!
He dressed and went out into the garden. He was early, early even for old Markabee, from whose little cottage even now the smoke was curling, thin and blue, into the morning air.
In spite of the panic of anxiety of a while ago, he had forgotten the little stone maid. The enchantment of the garden was on him, his feet trod the stone pathway, his hands were behind his back, his head bent a little forward, yet he saw everything, the trim, carefully laid out beds, the green grass, the foxglove and the hollyhock thrusting their way to life and air and sun through the crevices in the old stone path. So he stepped aside to avoid tramping on their loveliness, yet wondered why they should be there.
Was it right? What would my Lady say? And he? Was not he dallying here when he should be at his work?
What thoughts! What strange jumble of thoughts was this?