The Charwoman’s Shadow

long for this day, when he could go forth again a hale man once more, and be in the sunlight and hear the birds and ride away, and never have any more to do with that house. Yet here were the sunlight and birds, and the house was behind him, and his horse was waiting for him a little way off, and none of the joy he had looked for came near him at all. He was free of that house at last and unhappy to be free. Never had he thought so much or thought less clearly, for all his thoughts were contradicting each other; and Mirandola’s eyes made it harder to think than ever. They were happy eyes, caring little, it seemed, for his trouble. And what was his trouble? Something profoundly wrong with the bright morning, that could not be easily cured; and the future coming up all dull and listless for years and years and years. Indeed his brain was in a whirl.

“You are glad to be leaving us?” said Mirandola as they crossed the strip of heather.

“Yes,” said the Duke, “I am sorry.”

It was the Duke that thought over what he had answered more than Mirandola. She said no more, but he pondered on his own words. He had said he was sorry. Yes, that was the truth of it. An accursed house no doubt, and yet it had hold of his heartstrings. Sighing he walked on slowly and came to the forest with Mirandola beside him, and the four chiefs of his bowmen a short way behind. And now his thoughts became fewer and simpler.

“Señorita,” he said, “are you glad that I am leaving you?”

“Yes,” she said, “I am sorry.”

She had repeated his own confused words! Which did she mean?

He turned round to his four men, who halted to hear his order.

“Hunt rabbits,” he said.

And at once the chiefs of the bowmen disappeared in the forest; and the Duke with Mirandola walked on in silence. And no words came to him to say what was weighing upon his heart to this flashing elfin lady. He that ruled over the deeps of so great a forest had many affairs to weigh and discharged them with many commands, and his words had earned from men a repute for wisdom; but as for the fawns he loved, that slipped noiselessly across clearings; and wide-winged herons that came down at evening along a slant of the air; foxes, eagles, and roe-deer; he knew not their language. And now he felt as he had sometimes felt, watching alone by the clearings, when the things of the wild came gliding by through a hush that seemed all theirs; and he loved their beautiful shapes and their shy wild ways, and his heart went out towards them; but there lay the gulf between him and them across which no words could call. So he felt now as he looked on Mirandola, fearing that words were not shaped for what he would say. He halted and looked long on her, and no words came to his lips. They were near the road at the spot where his horse waited, and he feared that they soon might part, with all unsaid. But those proud eyes of his were saying all he would say; the twinkle of merriment in Mirandola’s eyes died down under the gaze of them, and a graver look came to her face, and her merry look did not return till he spoke and she heard common human words again.

“Will you marry me, Mirandola?” he said at last.

It was then that the twinkle dawned again in her eyes.

“I am engaged to Señor Gulvarez,” she said.

“Gulvarez!” he said.

“Yes, my father arranged it,” said Mirandola.

“Gulvarez shall hang,” said the Duke.

“I thought he was your friend,” said Mirandola.

“Aye,” said the Duke, “truly. But he shall hang.”

And one last favour she did for Gulvarez, that had had so few favours of her hitherto; for when she saw that the Duke was truly bent upon hanging him, and was indeed earnest in the matter, she besought him to put it aside, and would not answer the question that he had asked her until he had sworn that Gulvarez should go unhung. Then she consented.

And now from the obscurer part of the garden, where they had lurked while the Duke went by, Gonsalvo and Gulvarez came forth. Gonsalvo walked with all the lightness of one from whom a burden has slipped; and Gulvarez with downcast head and moody air, and silence grudgingly broken when at all: so they walked in the garden.

“He never saw us,” said Gonsalvo cheerily.

“No,” said Gulvarez.

Little light shells crunched under their feet along the path while Gonsalvo waited for a further answer.

“He is gone,” said Gonsalvo.

This time Gulvarez made no answer at all, and the shells crunched on in silence.

Gonsalvo believed that all things were as bright as his own mood, but when he perceived that this was not so with Gulvarez he spoke to him of the three fair fields, though it cost him a sigh to do it. And even this made no rift in the heavy mood of Gulvarez.

“They are fair, are they not?” asked Gonsalvo.

“Yes, yes,” said Gulvarez impatiently, and fell to nursing again that curious silence.

And at this Gonsalvo wondered, until he wondered at a new thing. For all of a sudden he wondered, “Where is Peter?”

Peter was holding the horse of the Duke a little way down the road: why had he not returned? Was the man straying away to wanton in idleness when there was work to be done in the stables? He peered about in vexation, and still no sign of Peter.

The Duke must have reached the road long since, and ridden away: Peter should have returned immediately. No work, no wages, he thought. And in his anger his mind dwelt long on Peter.

And then he thought: “Where ever is Mirandola?”

“It is curious,” he said to Gulvarez, “I do not see Mirandola returning.”

Almost a look