"I do understand. You have given up a lot for me. Perhaps I was a great fool at Constantine. I begin to believe I was. But, after all, there's no great harm done. The libretto is mine—ours, ours. And we're not going to give it up. I'll try—I'll try to put my heart into the music, to bring off a real success, to give you all you want, pay you back for all you've given up for me and the work. Of course, I may fail—"
She stopped his mouth with her lips, wrenched herself from his grasp, and hurried away.
A moment later he heard the heavy low door of her bedroom creak as she pushed it to, then the grinding of the key in the lock.
He sat down on the divan she had just left. For a moment he sat still, facing the gallery, and the carved wooden balustrade which protected its further side. Then he turned and looked out through the low, grated window, from which no doubt in days long since gone by veiled Arab women had looked as they sat idly on the divan.
He saw a section of almost black-purple sky. He saw some stars. And, leaning his cheek on his hand, he gazed through the little window for a long, long time.
CHAPTER XXV
More than a year had passed away. April held sway over Algeria.
In the white Arab house on the hill Claude and Charmian still lived and Claude still worked. To escape the great heat of the previous summer they had gone to England for a time, but early October had found them once more at Djenan-el-Maqui, and since then they had not stirred.
Their visit to London had been a strange experience for Charmian.