Of the fallen carnage pole Rotha knew nothing, and needed not that to be a.s.sured that the chance of her ever hearing Mr. Southwode speak again was a very, very slender one. She did not think; she merely knew all this, with a dumb, blank consciousness; she stood still, mechanically pressing her hands upon her heart. The noise of the horses" hoofs and the rushing wheels had been swallowed up by the intervening hill, and the stillness was simply mocking in its tranquil peacefulness. The sunlight at the glory of which they had both been looking, had hardly died away from the landscape; and one of them, most likely, was beyond seeing the light of earth forevermore. Rotha stood as still as death herself, listening for a sound that came not, and gradually growing white and whiter. Yet she never was in any danger of fainting; no sealing of her senses served as a release to her pain; in full, clear consciousness she stood there, and heard the silence and saw the sweet fall of the evening light upon the plain. Only stunned; with a consciousness that was but partially alive to suffering. I suppose the mind cannot fully take in such a change at once.
She was so stunned, that several minutes pa.s.sed before she could act, or move; and it seemed that the silence and peace had long been reigning over hill and plain, when she roused herself to go down the road.
She went then with dreadful haste, yet so trembling that she could not go as fast as she would. The horror of what might be at the bottom of the hill might have kept her for ever upon it; but the need to know was greater still; and so with an awful fear of what every step might bring her to, she sped down the hill. She heard no noise; she saw no wreck; following the winding of the road, which wound fearfully down such a steep, she came to the railway crossing and pa.s.sed it, and followed on still further down; the curve of the road always hiding from her what might be beyond. Her feet got wings at last; she was shaking in every joint, yet fairly flew along, being unable to endure the fear and uncertainty. No trace of any disaster met her eyes; no call for help or cry to the horses came to her ears; what did the silence portend?
Just at the bottom the road made another sharp turn around a clump of woodland. Rounding this turn, Rotha came suddenly upon what she sought.
The first glance shewed her that Mr. Southwode was upon his feet; the second that the horses were standing still. Rotha hardly saw anything more. She made her way, still running, till she got to Mr. Southwode"s side, and there stopped and looked at him; with white lips apart and eyes that put an intense question. For though she saw him standing and apparently well able to stand, the pa.s.sion of fear could not so immediately be driven out by the evidence of one sense alone. He met the urgency of her eyes and smiled.
"I am all right," he said.
"Not hurt?"
"Not in the least."
Looking at her still, for her face had startled him, he saw a change come over it which was beyond the demands of mere friendly solicitude, even when very warm. He saw the flash of intense joy in her eyes, and what was yet more, a quiver in the unbent lovely lines about the mouth. One does not stop to reason out conclusions at such a time. Mr. Southwode was still holding the reins of the panting horses, the carriage was a wreck a few yards off, they were miles away from home; he forgot it all, and acting upon one of those subtle instincts which give no account of themselves, he laid one arm lightly around Rotha and bent down and kissed the unsteady lips.
A sudden flood of scarlet, so intense that it was almost pain, shot over Rotha"s face, and her eyes drooped and failed utterly to meet his. She had been very near bursting into tears, woman"s natural relief from overstrained nerves; but his kiss turned the current of feeling into another channel, and the sting of delight and pain was met by an overwhelming consciousness. Had she betrayed herself? What made him do that? It was good for Rotha just then that she was no practised woman of the world, not skilled in any manner of evasion or trick of deceptive art. If she had been; if she had answered his demonstration with a little cold, careless laugh, and turned it off with a word of derision; as I suppose she would if she had not been so utterly true and honest, according to a woman"s terrible instinct of self-preservation, or preservation of her secret; he would have thought as he had thought before--she loves me as a child does. But the extreme confusion, and the lovely abas.e.m.e.nt of the lowered brow, went to his heart with their unmistakeable revelation. Instead of releasing her, he put both arms round her now and gently drew her up to him. But Rotha was by no means so clear in her mind as by this time he was. She did not understand his action, and so misinterpreted it. She made a brave effort to relieve him from what she thought overwrought grat.i.tude.
"That is nothing to thank me for, Mr. Southwode," she said. "Any friend would have been anxious, in my place."
"True. Were you anxious simply as a friend, Rotha?"
Rotha hesitated, and the hesitation lasted till it amounted to an eloquent answer; and the arms that held her drew her a little closer.
"But I do not understand--" she managed to say.
"Do you not? I do. I think I can make you understand too."
But his explanations were wordless, and if convincing were exceedingly confusing to Rotha.
"But Mr. Southwode!--what _do_ you mean?" she managed at last to say, trying to release herself.
"I mean, that you belong to me, and I belong to you, for the rest of our lives. That is what I mean."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes," said he with a low laugh; "and so are you. When you and I mean a thing, we mean it."
Rotha wondered that he could mean it, and she wondered how he could know that she meant it. Had she somehow betrayed herself? and how? She felt very humble, and very proud at the same time; in one way esteeming at its full value the woman"s heart and life she had to give, as every woman should; in another way thinking it not half good enough. Shamefaced, because her secret was found out, yet too honest and n.o.ble of nature to attempt any poor effort at deceit, she stood with lights and shadows flying over her face in a lovely and most womanly manner; yet mostly lights, of shy modesty and half veiled gladness and humble content. Fifty things came to her lips to say, and she could speak none of them; and she began to wish the silence would be broken.
"How did you know, Mr. Southwode?" she burst forth at last, that question pressing too hard to be satisfied.
"Know what?" said he.
"I mean--you know what I mean! I mean,--now came you--what made you-- speak as you did? I mean! _that_ isn"t it. I mean, what justification did you think you had?"
Mr. Southwode laughed his low laugh again.
"Do I need justification?"
"Yes, for jumping at conclusions."
"That is the way they say women always do."
"Not in such things!"
"Perhaps not. Certainly _you_ have not done it in this case."
"How came you to do it? Please answer me! Mr. Southwode, are you sure you know what you mean? You did not think of any such thing when we set out upon our drive this afternoon?" Rotha spoke with great and painful difficulty, but she felt she must speak.
"I had thought of it. But Rotha, I was not sure of you."
"In what way?"
"I knew you cared for me, a good deal; but I fancied it was merely a child"s devotion, which would vanish fast away as soon as the right claim was made to your heart."
"And why do you not think so still?" said Rotha, the flames of consciousness flashing up to her very brow. But Mr. Southwode only laughed softly and kissed, both lips and brow, tenderly and reverently, if very a.s.suredly.
"I have not done anything--" said Rotha, trembling and a little distressed.
"Nothing, but to be true and pure and natural; and so has come the answer to my question, which I might not have ventured to ask. Mrs. Purcell asked me to-day whether I was going to marry you, and I said no; for I never could have let you marry me with a child"s transient pa.s.sion and find out afterwards that your woman"s heart was not given me. But now I will correct my answer to Mrs. Purcell, if I have opportunity."
"But," said Rotha hesitating,--"I think in one thing you are mistaken. I do not think my feeling has really changed, since long ago."
"Did you give me your woman"s heart _then?_"
"You think I had it not to give; but I think, I gave you all I had. And though I have changed, _that_ has not changed."
"I take it," he said. "And what I have to give you, I will let my life tell you. Now we must try to get home."
Released from the arm that had held her all this while, Rotha for the first time surveyed the ground. There were the horses, standing quietly enough after their mad rush down the hill; panting yet, and feeling nervous, as might be seen by the movement of ears and air of head. And a few rods behind lay what had been the phaeton; now a thorough and utter wreck.
"How did it happen?" exclaimed Rotha, in a sudden spasm of dread catching hold of Mr. Southwode"s arm. He told her what had been the beginning of the trouble.
"What carelessness! But how have you escaped? And how came the carriage to be such a smash?"
"I knew what was before me, when on the hill the horses made that sudden pause and I saw the pole on the ground. I knew they would be still only that one instant. Then I told you to jump. You behaved very well."
"I did nothing," said Rotha. "The tone of your voice, when you said "Jump!" was something, or had something in it, which I could not possibly disobey. I did not want to jump, at all; but I had no choice. Then?--"
"Then followed what I knew must come. You saw how we went down the hill; but happily the road turned and you could not see us long. I do not know how we went scathless so far as we did; but at last the end of the pole of the phaeton lodged against some obstacle in the road, stuck fast, and the carriage simply turned a somersault over it, throwing me out into safety, and itself getting presently broken almost to shivers."
"Throwing you out into safety!" Rotha exclaimed, turning pale.
"Don"t I look safe?" said he smiling.
"And you are as cool as if nothing had happened."
"Am I? On the contrary, I feel very warm about the region of my heart, and as if a good deal had happened. Now Rotha, we have got to walk home.