She paused.  Sylvia was very white, but her eyes were quite resolute, unfailingly steadfast.

“Please don’t tell me any more!” she said.  “Whatever Burke did was—­was from a good motive.  I know that.  I know him.  And—­I don’t want to have any unkind feelings towards him.”

“You prefer to remain blind?” said Mrs. Merston with her bitter smile,

“Yes—­yes,” Sylvia said.

“Then you are building your house on the sand,” said Mrs. Merston, and turned from her with a shrug.  “And great will be the fall thereof.”

CHAPTER III

THE BARGAIN

THE visitors did not leave until the sun was well down in the west.  To Sylvia it had been an inexplicably tiring day, and when they departed at length she breathed a wholly unconscious sigh of relief.

“Come for a ride!” said Burke.

She shook her head.  “No, thank you.  I think I will have a rest.”

“All right.  I’ll smoke a pipe on the stoep,” he said.

He had been riding round his land with Merston during the greater part of the afternoon, and it did not surprise her that he seemed to think that he also had earned a quiet evening.  But curiously his decision provoked in her an urgent desire to ride alone.  A pressing need for solitude was upon her.  She yearned to get right away by herself.

She went to her room, however, and lay down for a while, trying to take the rest she needed; but when presently she heard the voice of Hans Schafen, his Dutch foreman, talking on the verandah, she arose with a feeling of thankfulness, donned her sun-hat, and slipped out of the bungalow.  It was hot for walking, but it was a relief to get away from the house.  She knew it was quite possible that Burke would see her go, but she believed he would be too engrossed with business for some time to follow her.  It was quite possible he would not wish to do so, but she had a feeling that this was not probable.  He generally sought her out in his leisure hours.

Almost instinctively she turned her steps in the direction of the kopje which she had so often desired to climb.  It rose steep from the veldt like some lonely tower in the wilderness.  Curious-shaped rocks cropped out unexpectedly on its scarred sides and a few prickly pear bushes stood up here and there like weird guardians of the rugged stronghold.  Sylvia had an odd feeling that they watched her with unfriendly attention as she approached.  Though solitude girt her round, she did not feel herself to be really alone.

It took her some time to reach it, for the ground was rough and sandy under her feet, and it was farther away than it looked.  She realized as she drew nearer that to climb to the round summit would be no easy task, but that fact did not daunt her.  She felt the need for strenuous exercise just then.