“What did it mean, then?”

“That she’d left off showing that she cared for him.  And he cared more for her, that man, after having left her, than he did before.  In its way it was a sort of test.”

“I pray heaven—­” said Anne; but she was too greatly shocked by the anecdote to shape her prayer.

Majendie, feeling that the time, the place, and her mood were propitious for the exposition, went on.

“There’s another man I know.  He was very fond of Edie.  He’s fond of her still.  He’ll come and sit for hours playing backgammon with her.  And yet all his fondness for her hasn’t kept him entirely straight.  But he’d have been as straight as anybody if he could have married her.”

“But what does all this prove?”

“It proves nothing,” he said almost passionately, “except that these two things, just because they’re different, are not so incompatible as you seem to think.”

“Did Edie care for that man?”

“I believe so.”

“Ah, don’t you see?  There’s the difference.  What made Edie a saint made him a sinner.”

“I doubt if Edie would look on it quite in that light.  She thinks it was uncommonly hard on him.”

“Does she know?”

“Oh, there’s no end to the things that Edie knows.”

“And she loves him in spite of it?”

“Yes.  I suppose there’s no end to that either.”

No end to her loving.  That was the secret, then, of Edie’s peace.

Anne meditated upon that, and when she spoke again her voice rang on its vibrating, sub-passionate note.

“And you said that I gave you rest.  You were different.”

He made as if he would draw nearer to her, and refrained.  The kind heart of Nature was in league with his.  Nature, having foreknowledge of her own hour, warned him that his hour was not yet.

And so he waited, while Nature, mindful of her purpose, began in Anne Majendie her holy, beneficent work.  The soul of the place was charged with memories, with presciences, with prophecies.  A thousand woodland influences, tender timidities, shy assurances, wooed her from her soul.  They pleaded sweetly, persistently, till Anne’s brooding face wore the flush of surrender to the mysteries of earth.

The spell was broken by a squirrel’s scurrying flight in the boughs above them.  Anne looked up, and laughed, and their moment passed them by.

CHAPTER X

“Are you tired?” he asked.

They had walked about the wood, made themselves hungry, and lunched like labourers at high noon.

“No, I’m only thirsty.  Do you think there’s a cottage anywhere where you could get me some water?”

“Yes, there’s one somewhere about.  I’ll try and find it if you’ll sit here and rest till I come back.”

She waited.  He came back, but without the water.  His eyes sparkled with some mysterious, irrepressible delight.