"I don't know how to tell you—you sent me Mammy Dicey—I can't thank you—now you have saved Morgan—"
The music was coming nearer. The sound of drums and fife throbbed loudly in the quiet night. Suddenly the flare of lights shot through the grove. The torchlight procession had reached the gate, and now many voices were calling loudly for their new representative.
Natalia stopped in the midst of her words. A streak of light from one of the torches fell full upon Sargent's face, in which she saw with pitiless detail the signs of his great renunciation. In the knowledge her heart grew cold and still. She moved nearer him, and held out both her hands. For a little while they stood thus, each meeting the other's glance steadily. "When you were a little girl, Natalia," Sargent said tentatively, his words a whisper, "I always kissed you when I went away."
She leaned toward him, and in her uplifted face he read her answer. Putting his hands gently on he hair and pressing back the heavy coils, he kissed her on the brow.
Another loud cry from the impatient crowd, and the gates were thrown open and the grounds brilliantly illuminated by the torches.
Natalia stood where he had left her, watching him walk towards the crowd, his head held high, his figure outlined against the flaring torches. For a few moments she stood motionless, then going swiftly through the garden to the back veranda, she went up-stairs without meeting any one.
When she had reached the upper hall, the hurrahs and loud cheering of the crowd floated up to her through the open windows. Hesitating a moment, she finally went to the door leading on the balcony, and stood looking down upon the gathering.
Directly in front of the house the crowd was forming into a line. The band was already at the gate, closely following came the torch bearers, and last of all a carriage. She leaned forward, shading her eyes from the flickering illumination. He was in the carriage now, on the back seat, and beside him sat an old, grizzled-haired man, whose weather-beaten, joyful countenance beamed upon Sargent in his hour of triumph.
As she watched them the signal was given, the drums beat a resounding tattoo, the fife took up the melody, and the parade began to move. Through the gate they went and out into the road, where the sounds gradually grew muffled and the flaring torches, gleaming through the trees, became faint as fireflies. At last the drum sounded in a faint echo; then the night grew once more dark and still.
A hand grasped Natalia's. Starting, she turned and found Morgan's arm about her.