So he bade good-night. Miss Sheckleton gave him a little friendly pressure as they shook hands at parting. Miss Fanshawe neither gave nor refused her hand. He took it; he held it for a moment—that slender hand, all the world to him, clasped in his own, yet never to be his, lodged like a stranger's for a moment there—then to go, for ever. The hand was carelessly drawn away; he let it go, and never a word spoke he.
The ladies entered the deep shadow of the trees. He listened to the light steps fainting into silent distance, till he could hear them no more.
Suspense—still suspense.
Those words spoken in her clear undertone—terrible words, that seemed at the moment to thunder in his ears, "loud as a trumpet with a silver sound"—were they, after all, words of despair, or words of hope?
"One word more of this kind, to-night, you are not to say to me."
How was he to translate the word "to-night" in this awful text? It seemed, as she spoke it, introduced simply to add peremptoriness to her forbiddance. But was that its fair meaning? Did it not imply that the prohibition was limited only to that night? Might it not mean that he was free to speak more—possibly to hear more—at a future time?
A riddle? Well! he would read it in the way most favourable to his hopes; and who will blame him? He would have no oracles—no ambiguities—nothing but sharply defined certainty.
With an insolent spirit, instinct with an impatience and impetuosity utterly intolerant of the least delay or obstruction, the interval could not be long.