“Not in the least, and I can carry a portmanteau on my horse.”
Then, without more words, they turned and walked slowly up the broad path.
As they went Angela looked about her with troubled eyes.
“I feel,” she said, “as if I were going to another planet or into another world. I wonder if I shall ever return here again or ever, ever walk in this garden again with you!”
“We shall never walk here any more,” replied Isabey, in a low voice. Angela glanced toward him, and each read the other’s soul. Then they averted their eyes; their glances were too poignant. After a pause Isabey said: “When I have taken you to your husband I shall hope for your happiness. You are very young and life holds much for you. Some day I shall see you a happy wife.”
“I am sure you will,” replied Angela, calmly. “I have no one in the world except Neville and I shall devote my life to him, and why shouldn’t we be happy together?”
“You will be very happy together,” replied Isabey. Like Angela, he believed in a decent cloaking of the chained passions, those wild beasts which, if they are not subdued, devour men and women.
CHAPTER XXI
DUST AND ASHES
AS Isabey opened the iron gate for Angela to pass through, they noticed the few negroes left on the place running toward the main entrance of the house, which faced landward.
They were exclaiming loudly, after the fashion of their race, at something which was coming slowly down the long cedar lane. It was an ordinary one-horse tumbril cart, driven by a negro sitting on a plank laid athwart, and in the cart lay a long narrow box covered over with a military cloak. Tied behind the cart followed a horse, fully accoutered, with the stirrups crossed over the cavalry saddle.