“I think you ought to tell me; I think I ought to know,” he said, doggedly. “In fact—haven’t I the right to know?”
She was silent for some moments, while they still paced on steadily, side by side, leaving the gate in the garden further behind them at every step. So intent was he upon the girl, and so eagerly did he listen for her answer, that he did not observe that the plantation had changed to something of denser growth, and that the trees about them were thick and heavy, and the ground broken and uneven.
“Yes—I suppose you have the right,” she said at last. “I always suspected the man, Dandy—I always disliked him. But a little time since, presuming upon a chance meeting with me, he protested—oh—you will not remember this afterwards—will you?—he protested his love for me, in a fashion so violent, that I have feared him ever since. He said that the stories about you and that girl—Patience Miller——”
Do what he would, he could not repress a start—could not keep his face wholly within control. So violent had the start been, that she had stopped instinctively, and had dropped her hand from his arm.
“Why—what is the matter? Dandy dear—you are ill!”
“Nothing—nothing is the matter,” he replied, with a faint smile. “My God—what’s that?”
In the silence of the place, as the man and the woman stood looking into each other’s eyes, there had come, borne upon the still air, the unmistakable thud—thud of a spade in stiff earth. A question forced itself to the man’s lips, and found voice, quite as though some other voice had spoken.
“Madge—in Heaven’s name—what place is this?”
She stared at him, in mingled amazement and terror; while he, for his part, seemed to count the steady thud—thud near to them, as he might have counted his own heart beats, if life were ebbing from him.
“What place? Dandy—you are dreaming! Surely you know that this is the wood—the wood behind the mill—you know——”