But I was troubled at that, and had no mind to sound those unventured deeps which, at such moments, I could feel vaguely astir within me. Nor yet did I seriously consider what I truly desired of this slender maid within the circle of my arms, nor what was to come of such sudden encounters with their swift smile and oddly halting breath and the heart, surprised, rhyming rapidly and unevenly in a reckless measure which pleasured less than it embarrassed.
She loosed her hands and drew away from me, and leaned against the wall, not looking toward me.
"I think," she said in a stifled voice, "you are to have your wish this night.... Do you hear anything?"
In the intense stillness, straining my ears, I fancied presently that I heard a distant sound in the night. But if it had been so it died out, and the beat of my heart was louder. Then, of a sudden, I seemed to hear it again, and thought it was my pulses startled by sudden hope.
"What is that sound?" I whispered. "Do you hear it?"
"Aye."
"I hear it also.... Is it imagination? Is there a horse on the highway? Why, I tell you there is!... There is! Do you think he rides express?"
"Out o' the North, my lord," she whispered. And suddenly she turned, gave me a blind look, stretched out one hand.
"Why do you think that horseman comes for me!" I said. My imagination caught fire, flamed, and I stood shivering and crushing her fingers in my grasp. "Why—why—do you think so?" I stammered. "He's turned into William Street! He gallops this way! Damnation! He heads toward the Hall!—No! No! By God, he is in our street, galloping—galloping——"
Like a pistol shot came a far cry in the darkness: "Express-ho! I pass! I pass!" The racket of iron-shod hoofs echoed in the street; doors and windows flew open; a confusion of voices filled my ears; the rattling roar of the hoofs came to a clashing halt.