"When ... ah, you mean that night?"
"Do you still remember it?" she asked, leaning over to him. A pink flame leapt up in her cheeks, her glance swam in dreamy reminiscence.
"How can such things be forgotten?" he replied, frowning and smiling at the same time. "One must carry them to the grave."
"And as you rode home ... that night ... what did you think about?"
"You are always asking what I thought," he answered, while visions of that hour mounted to his brain and made him hot "I rode on and on, as if I were drunk. Every moment I expected to fall out of the saddle. And when I came to my own meadows, I drew in the roan. You remember it was the old roan then, with the white feet. I tethered him to a meadow-hurdle, and flung myself on the grass. It must have been nearly two o'clock, but it was a very close, sultry night; just a streak of red dawn was already in the sky. There I lay, asking myself, 'Is it possible? Can you really have experienced it? Are there such hours to be lived on earth?' And the roan grazed all the time, and round about was the new-mown hay. That got into one's senses, ay, it was enough to drive one mad...."
A soft cry escaped her lips. She had thrown her head back over the side of the chair, the blue veins stood out on her throat, her breast heaved tumultuously, and, with both hands pressed to her heart, she lay gasping for breath.
"What is the matter with you?" he asked, in much concern, for he feared a repetition of that scene.
"Nothing--nothing. It is only my stupid heart, nothing else."
"Can't I get you anything?"
"Thank you. It will soon be better ... it is better now."