His meaning was unmistakable. The force of what he said drove in upon her irresistibly. She burst into tears, hiding her face against his shoulder in her distress.
"But how dreadful! Oh, how dreadful! He is killing himself. I think--the Guy--I knew--is dead already."
"No, he isn"t," Burke said, and he held her with sudden closeness as he said it. "He isn"t--and that"s the h.e.l.l of it. But you can"t save him. No one can."
She lifted her face sharply. There was something intolerable in the words. With the tears upon her cheeks she challenged them.
"He can be saved! He must be saved! I"ll do it somehow--somehow!"
"You may try," Burke said, as he suffered her to release herself.
"You won"t succeed."
She forced a difficult smile with quivering lips. "You don"t know me. Where there"s a will, there"s a way. And I shall find it somehow."
He looked grim for an instant, then smiled an answering smile.
"Don"t perish in the attempt!" he said. "That do-or-die look of yours is rather ominous. Don"t forget you"re my partner! I can"t spare you, you know."
She uttered a shaky laugh. "Of course you can"t. Blue Hill Farm would go to pieces without me, wouldn"t it? I"ve often thought I"m quite indispensable."
"You are to me," said Burke briefly; and ere the quick colour had sprung to her face, he also had gone his way.
CHAPTER VIII
THE INTERRUPTION
Sylvia meant to ride round to Guy"s hut in search of him that evening, but when the time came something held her back.
Burke"s words, "You"ll drive him away," recurred to her again and again, and with them came a dread of intruding that finally prevailed against her original intention. He must not think for a moment that she desired to spy upon him, even though that dreadful craving in his eyes haunted her perpetually, urging her to action.
It seemed inevitable that for a time at least he must fight his devil alone, and with all her strength she prayed that he might overcome.
In the end she rode out with Burke, covering a considerable distance, and returning tired in body but refreshed in mind.
They had supper together as usual, but when it was over he surprised her by taking up his hat again.
"You are going out?" she said.
"I"m going to have a smoke with Guy," he said. "You have a game of Patience, and then go to bed!"
She looked at him uncertainly. "I"ll come with you," she said.
He was filling his pipe preparatory to departure. "You do as I say!" he said.
She tried to laugh though she saw his face was grim. "You"re getting rather despotic, partner. I shall have to nip that in the bud. I"m not going to stay at home and play Patience all by myself. There!"
He raised his eyes abruptly from his task, and suddenly her heart was beating fast and hard. "All right," he said. "We"ll stay at home together."
His tone was brief, but it thrilled her. She was afraid to speak for a moment or two lest he should see her strange agitation.
Then, as he still looked at her, "Oh no, partner," she said lightly. "That wouldn"t be the same thing at all. I am much too fond of my own company to object to solitude. I only thought I would like to come, too. I love the _veldt_ at night."
"Do you?" he said. "I wonder what has taught you to do that."
He went on with the filling of his pipe as he spoke, and she was conscious of quick relief. His words did not seem to ask for an answer, and she made none.
"When are you going to take me to Ritzen?" she asked instead.
"To Ritzen!" He glanced up again in surprise. "Do you want to go to Ritzen?"
"Or Brennerstadt," she said, "Whichever is the best shopping centre."
"Oh!" He began to smile. "You want to shop, do you? What do you want to buy?"
She looked at him severely. "Nothing for myself, I am glad to say."
"What! Something for me?" His smile gave him that look--that boyish look--which once she had loved so dearly upon Guy"s face.
She felt as if something were pulling at her heart. She ignored it resolutely.
"You will have to buy it for yourself," she told him sternly.
"I"ve got nothing to buy it with. It"s something you ought to have got long ago--if you had any sense of decency."
"What on earth is it?" Burke dropped his pipe into his pocket and gave her his full attention.
Sylvia, with a cigarette between her lips, got up to find the matches. She lighted it very deliberately under his watching eyes, then held out the match to him. "Light up, and I"ll tell you."
He took the slender wrist, blew out the match, and held her, facing him.
"Sylvia," he said. "I ought to have gone into the money question with you before. But all I have is yours. You know that, don"t you?"
She laughed at him through the smoke. "I know where you keep it anyhow, partner," she said. "But I shan"t take any--so you needn"t be afraid."
"Afraid!" he said, still holding her. "But you are to take it.
Understand? It"s my wish."
She blew the smoke at him, delicately, through pursed lips. "Good my lord, I don"t want it. Couldn"t spend it if I had it. So now!"
"Then what is it I am to buy?" he said.
Lightly she answered him. "Oh, you will only do the paying part.
I shall do the choosing--and the bargaining, if necessary."
"Well, what is it?" Still he held her, and there was something of insistence, something of possession, in his hold.
Possibly she had never before seemed more desirable to him--or more elusive. For she was beginning to realize and to wield her power.
Again she took a whiff from her cigarette, and wafted it at him through laughing lips.
"I want some wool--good wool--and a lot of it, to knit some socks--for you. Your present things are disgraceful."