“You will be back soon?”
“Quite soon.”
There was a moment’s quivering silence, and then Clemence slowly lifted her face. He took her in his arms again, and their lips met in one long agonised kiss. Neither spoke again. When he released her, Julian, with a face like death, turned and went away down the street, his head bent, his whole figure tense as though he were facing a blinding wind. Clemence stood for a moment still as a statue, her eyes wide, her face quite quiet. Then she too went away through the night.
CHAPTER XII
Over the country about Henley, that same day, the sun was shining gloriously.
It was about five o’clock in the afternoon, and there was a clearness about the light, a distinctness about the shadows, which, taken in conjunction with the heavy bank of clouds into which the sun would presently sink, argued coming rain. For the present, however, nature was lovely to look at; and a garden-party which was going on in the large, old-fashioned garden of a large, old-fashioned country house, about a mile from the river, had the benefit of every advantage which atmosphere and surroundings could give.
It was a large party, and the scene was very bright and animated. On the larger of the two lawns, conspicuous among the well-dressed but by no means striking-looking women about her, stood Mrs. Romayne, talking to a local magnate.
She had arrived about half an hour before, and the politely concealed satisfaction and surprise with which she had been received had testified to the fact that her appearance at such a function was a phenomenon in the neighbourhood. Invitations had showered in on her during her residence at the “cottage,” but it had gradually become an established fact that she was “going out very little.” This was in truth the first party she had attended. It was fortunate that her hostess was not a particularly observant person. There had been something about Mrs. Romayne when she arrived which might have dashed that hostess’s personal elation with a suspicion that her guest’s appearance had been dictated by motives not wholly complimentary to the party; lines about the mouth which suggested the enforced endurance of a burden from which she was seeking temporary relief, however fictitious; a restlessness in the eyes which suggested an attempt at the eluding of the too insistent companionship of her own thoughts.
Her eyes were painfully bright, and there was a nervous tension about her manner as she stood there on the lawn, talking and laughing. But her companion of the moment—a worthy old gentleman, with not much acquaintance among women of the world—thought her simply the most astonishingly charming woman he had ever met; and seeking in his mind for lines on which to make himself agreeable to her, he recollected to have heard something about her son.