“For whom is that?” asked Lord Blantyre.
The man stared.
“For the young woman, my lord.”
Lord Blantyre steadied himself with the hand that gripped the speaker’s arm; then, lifting the cane with the other, struck the fellow across the knuckles so sharply that with a howl he let the purse fall.
“Pick it up,” said the Wicked Earl. “Put it into your pocket, and remember, for the future, that the servant who presumes to know his master’s business least understands his own.”
The litter was brought to the door of his chamber, and they carried him out through the kitchen to the porch; and there, where Pomona stood waiting, he bade them halt and set it down. She leaned toward him to look on him, she told herself, for the last time. Her heart contracted to see him so wan and exhausted.
“Good-by, Pomona,” said he, gazing up into her sorrowful eyes, distended in the evening dimness. He had seen a deer look at him thus, in the dusk, out of a thicket.
“Good-by, my lord,” said she.
“Ah, Pomona,” said he, “I made a sweeter journey the day I came here!”
And without another word to her he signed to the men, and they buckled to their task again.