“I’m keen to go a little way up the hillside,” he said, forcing himself to break a silence that was growing oppressive.  “To get a sight of the Palace with the moon full on it.  We’ll be cautious—­not go too far.”

“I am ready to go anywhere,” she answered; and the fervour of that simple statement told him she was not thinking of hillsides any more than he was—­at the back of his mind.

Silence was unkinder than speech; and as they passed out into the open, he scanned the near prospect for a convenient spot.  Not far above them a fragment of ruined wall, overhung by trees, ended in a broken arch; its lingering keystone threatened by a bird-borne acacia.  A fallen slab of stone, half under it, offered a not too distant seat.  Slab and arch were in full light; the space beyond, engulfed in shadow.

Far up the hillside a jackal laughed.  Across the valley another answered it.  A monkey swung from a branch on to the slab, and sat there engaged in his toilet—­a very imp of darkness.

“Not be-creeped—­are you?” Roy asked.

“Just the littlest bit!  Nice kind of creeps.  I feel quite safe—­with you.”

The path was rough in parts.  Once she stumbled and his hand closed lightly on her arm under the cloak.  She felt safe with him—­and he must turn and smite her——!

At their approach, the monkey fled with a gibbering squeak:  and Roy loosened his hold.  Between them and the lake loomed the noble bulk of the palace; roof-terraces and facades bathed in silver, splashed with indigo shadow; but for them—­mere man and woman—­its imperishable strength and beauty had suddenly become a very little thing.  They scarcely noticed it even.

“There—­sit,” Roy said softly, and she obeyed.

Her smile mutely invited him; but he could not trust himself—­yet.  He might have known the moonlight would go to his head.

“Aruna—­my dear——­” he plunged without preamble.  “I took you away from them all because—­well—­we can’t pretend any more ... you and I. It’s fate—­and there we are.  I love you—­dearly—­truly.  But....”

How could one go on?

“Oh, Roy!”

Her lifted gaze, her low impassioned cry told all; and before that too clear revealing his hard-won resolution quailed.

“No—­not that.  I don’t deserve it,” he broke out, lashing himself and startling her.  “I’ve been a rank coward—­letting things drift.  But honestly I hadn’t the conceit—­we were cousins ... it seemed natural.  And now ... this!”

A stupid catch in his throat arrested him.  She sat motionless; never a word.

Impulsively he dropped on one knee, to be nearer, yet not too near.  “Aruna—­I don’t know how to say it.  The fact is ... they were afraid, at Home, if I came out here, I might—­it might ...  Well, just what’s come to us,” he blurted out in desperation.  “And Mother told me frankly—­it mustn’t be, twice running ... like that.”  Her stillness dismayed him.  “Dear,” he urged tenderly, “you see their difficulty—­you understand?”