The Professor had risen. He heard the last words, but made no remonstrance. Yet there was a something in his expression that gave comfort.
“I fear I shall have to be going back,” he said, looking at his watch. As he spoke, the first notes of a nightingale stole out of the shrubbery. Voices were hushed, and the three stood listening spellbound, to the wonderful impassioned song. Hadria marvelled at its strange serenity, despite the passion, and speculated vaguely as to the possibility of a paradox of the same kind in the soul of a human being. Passion and serenity? Had not the Professor combined these apparent contradictions?
There was ecstasy so supreme in the bird’s note that it had become calm again, like great heat that affects the senses, as with frost, or a flooded river that runs swift and smooth for very fulness.
Presently, a second nightingale began to answer from a distant tree, and the garden was filled with the wild music. One or two stars had already twinkled out.
“I ought really to be going,” said the Professor.
But he lingered still. His eyes wandered anxiously to Hadria’s white face. He said good-night to Valeria, and then he and Hadria walked to the gate together.
“You will come back and see us at Craddock Dene soon after you return, won’t you?” she said wistfully.
“Of course I will. And I hope that meanwhile, you will set to work to get strong and well. All your leisure ought to be devoted to that object, for the present. I should be so delighted to hear from you now and again, when you have a spare moment and the spirit moves you. I will write and tell you how I fare, if I may. If, at any time, I can be of service to you, don’t forget how great a pleasure it would be to me to render it. I hope if ever I come back to England——”
“When you come back,” Hadria corrected, hastily.
——“that we may meet oftener.”