He did not move, and she went to him on her knees, reaching for the pitcher and the wine. He raised a hand as though to repulse her, but she put it gently aside.
Yet all the while that she was busy with his shoulder he sat with bowed head, silent, brooding, not even wincing when she cleaned the raw wound, and poured in wine. His eyes stared at the grass; the only pain he felt was the mystical anguish that her soft hands caused him.
“There!”
She knelt facing him of a sudden, her eyes looking steadily into his face.
“Now, you may speak to me, Martin Valliant. There can be no silence between us. Tell me all that is in your heart.”
His head seemed to sink lower.
“Are you afraid of me, Martin—you who would fear no man? What am I but a woman?”
“It is the woman I fear.”
“Oh! man—man!”
He answered her sullenly.