“Ethne,” he said a third time. He stretched out a hand timidly and touched her dress.
“It is not Ethne,” he cried with a start.
“No, it is not Ethne,” Mrs. Adair answered quietly. Durrance drew back a step from the window, and for a little while was silent.
“Where has she gone?” he asked at length.
“Into the garden. She ran across the terrace and down the steps very quickly and silently. I saw her from my chair. Then I heard you speaking alone.”
“Can you see her now in the garden?”
“No; she went across the lawn towards the trees and their great shadows. There is only the moonlight in the garden now.”
Durrance stepped across the window sill and stood by the side of Mrs. Adair. The last slip which Ethne had made betrayed her inevitably to the man who had grown quick. There could be only one reason for her sudden, unexplained, and secret flight. He had told her that Feversham had wandered south from Wadi Halfa into the savage country, had spoken his fears as to Feversham’s fate without reserve, thinking that she had forgotten him, and indeed rather inclined to blame her for the callous indifference with which she received the news. The callousness was a mere mask, and she had fled because she no longer had the strength to hold it up before her face. His first suspicions had been right. Feversham still stood between Ethne and himself, and held them at arm’s length.
“She ran as though she was in great trouble and hardly knew what she was doing,” Mrs. Adair continued. “Did you cause that trouble?”
“Yes.”
“I thought so, from what I heard you say.”
Mrs. Adair wanted to hurt, and in spite of Durrance’s impenetrable face, she felt that she had succeeded. It was a small sort of compensation for the weeks of mortification which she had endured. There is something which might be said for Mrs. Adair; extenuations might be pleaded, even if no defence was made. For she, like Ethne, was overtaxed that night. That calm pale face of hers hid the quick passions of the south, and she had been racked by them to the limits of endurance. There had been something grotesque, something rather horrible, in that outbreak and confession by Durrance, after Ethne had fled from the room. He was speaking out his heart to an empty chair. She herself had stood without the window with a bitter longing that he had spoken so to her and a bitter knowledge that he never would. She was sunk deep in humiliation. The irony of the position tortured her; it was like a jest of grim selfish gods played off upon mortals to their hurt. And at the bottom of all her thoughts rankled that memory of the extinguished lamp and the low hushed voices speaking one to the other in darkness. Therefore she spoke to give pain, and was glad that she gave it, even though it was to the man whom she coveted.
“There’s one thing which I don’t understand,” said Durrance. “I mean the change which we both noticed in Ethne tonight. I mistook the cause of it. I was a fool. But there must have been a cause. The gift of laughter had been restored to her. She became just what she was five years ago.”
“Exactly,” Mrs. Adair answered. “Just what she was before Mr. Feversham disappeared from Ramelton. You are so quick, Colonel Durrance. Ethne had good news of Mr. Feversham this morning.”
Durrance turned quickly towards her, and Mrs. Adair felt a pleasure at his abrupt movement. She had provoked the display of some emotion, and the display of emotion was preferable to his composure.
“Are you quite sure?” he asked.
“As sure as that you gave her bad news tonight,” she replied.
But Durrance did not need the answer. Ethne had made another slip that evening, and, though unnoticed at the time, it came back to Durrance’s memory now. She had declared that Feversham still drew an allowance from his father. “I heard it only today,” she had said.
“Yes, Ethne heard news of Feversham today,” he said slowly. “Did she make a mistake five years ago? There was some wrong thing Harry Feversham was supposed to have done. But was there really more misunderstanding than wrong? Did she misjudge him? Has she today learnt that she misjudged him?”
“I will tell you what I know. It is not very much. But I think it is fair that you should know it.”
“Wait a moment, please, Mrs. Adair,” said Durrance sharply. He had put his questions rather to himself than to his companion, and he was not sure that he wished her to answer them. He walked abruptly away from her and leaned upon the balustrade with his face towards the garden.
It seemed to him rather treacherous to allow Mrs. Adair to disclose what Ethne herself evidently intended to conceal. But he knew why Ethne wished to conceal it. She wished him never to suspect that she retained any love for Harry Feversham. On the other hand, however, he did not falter from his own belief. Marriage between a man crippled like himself and a woman active and vigorous like Ethne could never be right unless both brought more than friendship. Here disloyalty seemed the truest of all. He turned back to Mrs. Adair.
“Tell me what you know, Mrs. Adair. Something might be done perhaps for Feversham. From Assouan or Suakin something might be done. This news—this good news came, I suppose, this afternoon when I was at home.”
“No, this morning when you were here. It was brought by a Captain Willoughby, who was once an officer in Mr. Feversham’s regiment.”
“He is now Deputy-Governor of Suakin,” said Durrance. “I know the man. For three years we were
