you won’t!” the man muttered, keeping his arm securely round her waist and striding swiftly towards the house. “No, I think you won’t!”
He paused when they reached the entrance into the garden and, taking her by the wrists, pressed her fiercely against one of the stone pillars upon which the gate hung.
“I know what it is,” he whispered. “You can’t deceive me. You’ve been with those people from London. You’ve been with that friend of Baltazar’s. That’s the cause of all this, isn’t it? You’ve been with that damned fool—that idiotic, good-for-nothing down at the village . Haven’t you been with him? Haven’t you?”
The arms with which he pressed her hands against her breast trembled with anger as he said these words.
“Baltazar told me,” he went on, “only this morning—down at Mundham—everything about these people . They’re of no interest, none, not the least. They’re just like every one else. That fellow’s half-foreign , that’s all. An American half-breed, of some mongrel sort or other, that’s all there is to be said of him! So if you’ve been letting any mad fancies get into your head about Mr. Sorio, the sooner you get rid of them the better. He’s not for you. Do you hear? He’s—not—for—you!” These last words were accompanied by so savage a tightening of the hands that held her that the girl was compelled to bite her lip to stop herself from crying.
“You hurt me,” she said calmly. “Let me go, Brand.” The self-contained tone of her voice seemed to quiet him and he released her. She raised one of her wrists to her mouth and softly caressed it with her lips.
“You’ll be interested, yourself, in these people before very long,” she murmured, flashing a mocking look at him over her bare arm. “The second girl is very young and very pretty. She confided in me that she was extremely afraid of the sea. She appealed to mother’s protective instincts at once. I’ve no doubt she’ll appeal to your—protective instincts! So don’t be too quick in your condemnation.”
“Damn you!” muttered her brother, pushing the gate open. “Come! Get in with you! You talk to me as if I were a professional rake. I take no interest—not the slightest—in your young innocents with their engaging terrors. To bed! To bed! To bed!”
He pushed her before him along the path, but Philippa knew well that the hand on her shoulder was lighter and less angry than the one that had held her a moment ago, and as she ascended the steps of Oakguard —the name borne by the Renshaw house since the days of the Conqueror—there flickered over her shadowy face the same equivocal smile of dubious meaning that had looked out at its owner, not so long since, from the mirror in her room.
When the dawn finally crept up, pallid and cold out of the North Sea and lifted, with a sort of mechanical weariness, the weight of the shadows, it was neither Brand nor Philippa who was awake.
Roused, as always, by the slightest approach of an unusual sound, the mother of that strange pair had lain in her bed listening ever since her daughter’s first emerging from the house.
Once she had risen, and had stood for a moment at the window, her loose grey hair mixed with the folds of an old, faded, dusky-coloured shawl. That, however, was when both of her children were away in the middle of the park and absolute silence prevailed. With thissingle exception she had remained listening, always silently listening, lying on her back and with an expression of tragic and harassed expectation in her great, hollow, brown eyes. She might have been taken, lying there alone in the big four-posted bed, surrounded by an immense litter of stored-up curios and mementoes, for a symbolic image of all that is condemned, as this mortal world goes round, to watch and wait and invoke the gods and cling fast to such pathetic relics and memorials as time consents to leave of the days that it has annihilated.
Slowly
He paused when they reached the entrance into the garden and, taking her by the wrists, pressed her fiercely against one of the stone pillars upon which the gate hung.
“I know what it is,” he whispered. “You can’t deceive me. You’ve been with those people from London. You’ve been with that friend of Baltazar’s. That’s the cause of all this, isn’t it? You’ve been with that damned fool—that idiotic, good-for-nothing down at the village . Haven’t you been with him? Haven’t you?”
The arms with which he pressed her hands against her breast trembled with anger as he said these words.
“Baltazar told me,” he went on, “only this morning—down at Mundham—everything about these people . They’re of no interest, none, not the least. They’re just like every one else. That fellow’s half-foreign , that’s all. An American half-breed, of some mongrel sort or other, that’s all there is to be said of him! So if you’ve been letting any mad fancies get into your head about Mr. Sorio, the sooner you get rid of them the better. He’s not for you. Do you hear? He’s—not—for—you!” These last words were accompanied by so savage a tightening of the hands that held her that the girl was compelled to bite her lip to stop herself from crying.
“You hurt me,” she said calmly. “Let me go, Brand.” The self-contained tone of her voice seemed to quiet him and he released her. She raised one of her wrists to her mouth and softly caressed it with her lips.
“You’ll be interested, yourself, in these people before very long,” she murmured, flashing a mocking look at him over her bare arm. “The second girl is very young and very pretty. She confided in me that she was extremely afraid of the sea. She appealed to mother’s protective instincts at once. I’ve no doubt she’ll appeal to your—protective instincts! So don’t be too quick in your condemnation.”
“Damn you!” muttered her brother, pushing the gate open. “Come! Get in with you! You talk to me as if I were a professional rake. I take no interest—not the slightest—in your young innocents with their engaging terrors. To bed! To bed! To bed!”
He pushed her before him along the path, but Philippa knew well that the hand on her shoulder was lighter and less angry than the one that had held her a moment ago, and as she ascended the steps of Oakguard —the name borne by the Renshaw house since the days of the Conqueror—there flickered over her shadowy face the same equivocal smile of dubious meaning that had looked out at its owner, not so long since, from the mirror in her room.
When the dawn finally crept up, pallid and cold out of the North Sea and lifted, with a sort of mechanical weariness, the weight of the shadows, it was neither Brand nor Philippa who was awake.
Roused, as always, by the slightest approach of an unusual sound, the mother of that strange pair had lain in her bed listening ever since her daughter’s first emerging from the house.
Once she had risen, and had stood for a moment at the window, her loose grey hair mixed with the folds of an old, faded, dusky-coloured shawl. That, however, was when both of her children were away in the middle of the park and absolute silence prevailed. With thissingle exception she had remained listening, always silently listening, lying on her back and with an expression of tragic and harassed expectation in her great, hollow, brown eyes. She might have been taken, lying there alone in the big four-posted bed, surrounded by an immense litter of stored-up curios and mementoes, for a symbolic image of all that is condemned, as this mortal world goes round, to watch and wait and invoke the gods and cling fast to such pathetic relics and memorials as time consents to leave of the days that it has annihilated.
Slowly
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