How it would rend her, heart and soul, to think that she, who would cast down her life like a mantle, for him to walk over, did he wish it, had brought him a burden of regret!
The thought hurt and stung her; it bit deeply into her brain. She rose and hurried on with quick steps to the garden, as if seeking its protection from these thoughts, that pursued her like living things.
Whatever happened, she thought, she would be content as long as no suffering through her fell on him. Nothing would she take, nothing would she accept from him, that meant loss or sacrifice to himself. On that she was quite resolved.
To a woman's passion is always added the wonderful instinct of maternal love. In all its wildness, in all its demands, there is still that guiding, underlying impulse to shield, to protect, to guard, to encircle with tender care the man she loves, and in Regina, now that she loved, this instinct rose to its full strength, and pervaded all her heart and soul. She herself and all that happened to her was of no moment. At all costs Everest was to be considered; his happiness kept safe and sacred in her hands.
Her quick walking soon brought her to the garden and the sea. As she unlocked the gate she noticed how the summer heat of the last twenty-four hours had called the laburnum into bloom. The whole garden glowed golden with it! On every side it gleamed and shone like amber rain, falling amongst the other foliage. Never had she seen it look so beautiful in its contrast with the pale blue of the sky, never had the rich yellow tint of it been so perfect. Rejoiced, she walked round all the narrow winding paths. She longed to show the garden to Everest, and it seemed as if it had arrayed itself in its most radiant and glorious dress in honour of his coming.
The standard rose-trees made of the centre a mass of vivid colour; the May was all in bloom, and the wild tamarisk threw up against the azure light a perfect foam of pink blossom. The perfumes from all the different flowering plants and trees floated mingling in the still and sheltered air like the strains of melody, wandering through and interwoven in a musical harmony; and the hum of the happy bees, the call of the nesting birds, the coo of the doves, rose and fell sweetly above the low murmur and ripple of the sea. Anxious and foreboding thoughts slipped from her mind; as always here, she relapsed joyously into reflecting simply upon Everest, upon his personality that so called to her own, upon the delight of his having come there, and all that wonder and rapture lying hidden in the heart of life to which her eyes were being opened.
She found her way to a little rustic seat beneath the palm at last, and there sat down, amongst the maze of roses, only wanting one thing to complete her happiness—his presence there.
The hot hours of the noonday went softly past, and the day hastened to array itself in fresh beauty to meet the sunset; the light began to deepen, the sky to flush with rose, the air to grow heavier with fragrance.
Those birds that were still singing, not yet exhausted by their nesting cares, gave out their last floods of melody before the approach of evening.