The calm tone in which this question was asked entirely upset Smalley; he stopped his hand exercise, and, crossing one leg over his knee, began to nurse it and sway slightly backward and forward. He did not answer his wife's question, and she watched him for a moment, and in her heart began to wonder how it was she had ever consented to marry this lanky, shuffling creature before her. She knew his moral character was irreproachable; if only his personal appearance were more prepossessing. She had truly and honestly tried to do her duty as his wife, but the chains of her bondage were beginning to gall. Mentally she was far Smalley's inferior. She could not live in the clear ether, in the pure air of his thoughts, and she was always unconsciously dragging him down while making many an honest effort to rise to his level. She had lived so quietly for so long a time that the sudden and unconventional manner of her meeting with Jackson had affected her powerfully. There was no denying that he was good-looking, and she had drifted into a flirtation with him at sight as naturally as a duck takes to the water. Oh, if life were only different for her! she thought as she watched Smalley swinging himself in his chair. The slow motion exasperated her; her nerves were at a tension, and she said sharply:
"Habakkuk, I wish you wouldn't fidget so! Can't you sit still anyhow, like any other mortal? Do read, or do something. I want to think, and my head is aching."
"Of course, of course," assented the missionary, and a furious light gleamed in his wife's eyes, which, fortunately for him, Habakkuk did not observe. He was a man slow of thought, and it was only after a little time that he began to realize that his wife had said she was in pain. He looked at her softly from his calm blue eyes, and then, putting forth his hand, laid it gently on hers. Ruys received the caress passively. Then Habakkuk was emboldened, and he tried to draw her toward him. She evaded him, however, by a deft turn of the shoulder, and, rising, walked to a table in the room, and picking up a heavy Bible placed it before her husband, as she said primly:
"It is getting very late. I think you had better read a chapter before going to bed."
CHAPTER V.
["FURIIS AGITATUS AMOR."]
Belike for her, a royal crown
I'd wager to a penny piece.
Old Play.
As Jackson and his guide left the gates of the parsonage Peregrine struggled with a temptation to look back over his shoulder. Finally he gave in with a sense of shame at his weakness, and then was unreasonably irritated to find that no shadowy figure behind the tinkling bead screen before the open window watched their passage down the moonlit road. The result was that for the first few hundred yards of their walk there was very little talk, for Peregrine's silence discouraged all the missionary's attempts at conversation. Suddenly the whole countryside seemed to be filled with the flashing light of gems. A blaze of jewelled glory came and vanished in a moment, and then appeared again in all its fairy beauty to slip away as swiftly as before.
"What on earth is that?" asked Peregrine, moved out of his reserve at the sight.