That night he came home—­pale and haggard, unshaven and unwashed.  He had spent the ten pounds until he had just enough left to buy two bottles of whisky.  With these he had wandered off on the home road, to sink to sleep when he could go no further and waken to another solitary orgy.

She had been working till after dark, in spite of Mrs. Twist’s remonstrances, to which she answered rudely and impatiently.  At last the elder woman thought it less wearing to the girl to leave her alone; she guessed that she would faint with physical weariness before she had got over her mental misery.  Louis could see the red glow in the sky for the last two miles of his dazed tramp; it led him homewards, muttering to himself about a pillar of fire and a pillar of cloud.  He looked into the house and saw that she was not there.  He had not known, till he saw the empty rooms, with her frock hanging over the hammock, her nightgown neatly folded on the shelf, her books and a pannikin half full of cold tea in the kitchen, how much he had counted on seeing her, how he had hungered for her, deep down, during all the nightmare week.  He felt too ashamed to go to the Homestead to look for her; then it occurred to him that she would be across the clearing.

And he met her, half-way.  She was coming along in the dull glow of the dying fire, the pickaxe over her shoulder.  She looked different to him; perhaps his eyes were distorted, perhaps the fire-glow making leaping shadows caused the difference; but she walked heavily, wearily, without the thrilling, young spring of swift movements that made her such an exhilaration to him.  He wanted to run across the clearing, lift her in his arms and charm away the tiredness; swiftly on top of that emotion came the realization that she was walking wearily partly because she had been doing his work, partly because her spirit was heavy and sick.  He felt sick with himself for having hurt her; he resented the misery his conscience was causing him:  swiftly he found himself resenting the ungainliness of her figure which, in his morbid mood, seemed his fault too.  He hated the unconscious reproach she gave him as she came along, stumbling a little, carrying the pickaxe.

He had finished his last spot of whisky at noon and had not slept since; he was worn and tired and frayed, even more than she was.  He was acutely uncomfortable for want of soap and water and food.

He dashed across the space between them, his eyes blazing madly, and she looked up, hearing his steps, seeing the blaze of his eyes, the tenseness of his clenched hands.

“Damn you—­damn you!” he cried, “playing the blasted Christian martyr.  Walking like that, to make people think I’ve made you tired!”

She stared at him, and her eyes filled with tears.  She had got to the stage of longing to see him so much that she did not care whether he were drunk or sober.  Then the ridiculousness of playing a role in the Bush at ten o’clock at night, struck her, and she laughed—­a rather cracked laugh.  He came close to her, all flaming with hate.  He noticed the blue shadows under her eyes, smelt the fire on her clothes.  She recoiled from the whisky on his breath, which, from association with her childhood’s horrors, always reduced her to a state of unreasoning terror.