Quamina looks anxiously into her face, as she relieves her young mistress of the dead blossoms.
"The Sahib is long in returning," she volunteers, with a nervous leer.
"Yes. We shall soon need a light."
"The devil will not catch him this evening; the devil is well employed," Quamina assures her. "Have no fear, lady."
"What do you mean?" asks Eleanor, a shade of anger crossing her face.
Quamina looks up proudly, delightedly.
"I have placed food and drink in the rock away from the roadside," she replies chuckling. "He will be busy eating, and never see the Sahib riding up the path. Quamina loves the Sahib and his white lady; she will provide for the devil."
Eleanor shrugs her shoulders in sheer despair. She cannot bring this woman to reason. With a pitying smile she returns to the window, and buries her fingers in the soft silk of those yellow pillows with an almost frantic clutch. They are just like the sofa cushions at Lyndhurst. Philip, perhaps, is lounging on them now, or Erminie—he has given them to Mrs. Lane for her new drawing-room.
She kneels for a while on the lounge, and though there is no sound her lips move.
Thus she stays, directly opposite the open window, listening and looking, wondering and praying.