“Oh, come, sir, come. You appear to know very little about women. Judith Strange would flirt on her wedding morning. But I, Captain Blake, want no youngsters playing round the woman I mean to marry. If moths come to my candle, pff, I snuff them out. Only twice, sir, have men dared to fight with me. They did not need a second dose.”
He tucked his hunting-crop under his arm, took off his hat ironically, and left Blake standing.
For the moment Hilary Blake’s anger had died out of him. He saw Sir Royce Severn disappear among the trees, and felt himself a fool for having ridden the high horse. The man had had the laugh of him. It was all natural, and logical enough.
Sir Royce Severn could be accused of neither madness nor insolence if he resented another man paying court to the woman who was to be his wife.
But Judith! And that wet sunset, and the walk upon the terrace, that leave-taking, the brushing of the syringa across his mouth! A flare of pain rushed through him. He thought of the exultation of an hour ago, of the wonder of joy that had been in his heart.
Had she been playing with him, fooling him? What was he to believe?
He was lost in the chaos of his own emotions, of love, anger, scorn, hate, shame, and savage regret. He would go back and hear the truth from her own lips. But no, the laughter of a coquette would be too bitter for him to bear. Great God! was she that heartless thing? Why should he believe this man’s word against her, throw over all that was sacred because of Severn’s confident sneers?
Hilary turned, and began to walk back along the path, staring at the ground in front of him, forgetting his bruised hand. The splendour was dying in the west, and a blue twilight flowing into the valleys; the hills looked black and cold.
“Hilary!”
She had come on him suddenly out of the twilight, and the red brocade dress that she was wearing seemed to catch the last rays of the sunset, and to glow amid the gloom. She was breathing fast as though she had been running, and he could see the rising and falling of her breast.