Angela said no more and the carriage jolted on. The shadows were growing long when the carriage, drawing up on the side of a wide road leading through a belt of woods, stopped, and Farley, opening the door and standing, cap in hand, said stiffly to Angela: “This is the point, Mrs. Tremaine, where we are instructed to wait. Captain Tremaine’s regiment will pass within a mile of us in half an hour and he will be on the lookout for us.”
“Thank you,” Angela responded sweetly, and, accepting Farley’s proffered hand, she descended from the carriage. “I think,” she said, “I will walk a little way into the woods; but I shall keep within sight of the road, so Captain Tremaine will see me as soon as he arrives.”
Farley, whose instructions were to remain with Angela and to place himself at Neville Tremaine’s disposal, stood discontentedly watching her as she walked daintily through the thicket, and he thought her one of the most ungrateful women that ever lived.
When a little out of sight of the road Angela looked about her. It might have been the same spot in which she had taken her real farewell of Isabey—the same dark overhanging pine trees, their resonant aroma filling the air, and the same slippery carpet of brown pine needles lay under her feet. Angela, hitherto so calm, began to feel a strange agitation. Neville Tremaine had been so much a part of her life since her babyhood that she had never had any right conception of him as her husband, but now all was changed. Her whole life was cast behind her and Neville was her only refuge and her sole possession.
She wished, however, to forget all the past and set about resolutely at forgetting. She had put Isabey out of her mind so far as she could, but it is quite possible to throttle a thought and yet hear it breathing in one’s ear. So it was with Angela. She fixed her consciousness upon Neville Tremaine, but her subconsciousness was with Isabey. One thing was certain: she could ever count upon Neville Tremaine’s tenderness, chivalry, and unshakable kindness.
As she walked up and down with her own peculiar and airy grace, she kept her eyes fixed on the open roadway. A mile off she could hear distinctly the clanking of ammunition wagons, the steady tramp of thousands of feet, the dull beating of the earth by horses’ hoofs.
Ten minutes had passed when she saw a horseman coming at a hard gallop along the woodland road. It was Neville Tremaine. In a minute or two he reached the carriage and flung himself off his horse. Farley spoke a word to him. Throwing his bridle toward the soldier-driver, Neville made straight through the thicket to where Angela stood. Angela felt herself taken in his strong arms and his mustached lips against hers. She clung to him, and it seemed to her as if it were Neville and yet not Neville. Only one thing was unmistakable: the old sense of well-being and protection when he was near came sweetly back to her. But of all else that passed in those first few minutes she scarcely knew, except that Neville held her to his strong beating heart and told her how dear she was to him.
Then he put her off a little way and gazed at her with tender admiration. Angela saw the great changes made in Neville by time and war. He looked much older and his naturally dark skin had grown darker with tan and sunburn. She could see, where his cap was raised a little from his brow, the whiteness of his forehead contrasted with the brownness of his face. He was campaigning, but otherwise there was the same immaculateness about him—neatly shaven, smartly uniformed, his accoutrement shining, all the marks of the trained officer.
As for Neville, his admiration for Angela burst from him as he looked at her. “Dearest,” he said, holding both her hands, “you have become beautiful. You are a woman now and not a child. You have grown up since that night on the wharf at Harrowby.”
“I have gone through that which makes a girl into a woman,” replied Angela, softly. “Until two nights ago I had every night at family prayers to hear every name called except yours, but I called your name in my heart.”