The Top of the World Part 75

When he was gone, they mounted the _kopje_ together, still hand in hand.

The way was steep, but they never rested till they reached the top.

The evening light was pa.s.sing, but the sky was full of stars. The _spruit_ was a swift-flowing river below them. They heard the rush of its waters--a solemn music that seemed to fill the world.

Sylvia turned her face to the north, and the long, dim range of hills beyond the _veldt_.

"We will go beyond some day," Burke said.

She held his hand very fast. "I don't mind where we go, partner, so long as we go together," she said.

He drew something out of his pocket and held it out to her. "I've got to give you this," he said.

She looked at him in surprise. "Burke! What is it?"

"It's something Guy left to you," he said, "with his love. I promised to give it you to-night. Take it, won't you?"

She took it, a small object wrapped in paper, strangely heavy for its size. "What is it?" she said again.

"Open it!" he said.

She complied, trembling a little. "Oh--Burke!" she said.

It lay in her hand, a rough stone like a small crystal, oddly shaped. The last of the evening light caught it, and it gleamed as if with living fire.

"The diamond!" she whispered.

"Yes--the diamond." Burke spoke very quietly. "He gave it to me just before he died. 'Tell her she is not to keep it!' he said.

'She is to sell it. I won it for her, and she is to make use of it.'"

"But--it is yours really," Sylvia said.

"No. It is yours." Burke spoke with insistence. "But I think he is right. You had better sell it. Vreiboom and some of Hoffstein's gang are after it. They don't know yet who won it.

Donovan covered Guy's tracks pretty cleverly. But they'll find out. It isn't a thing to keep."

She turned to him impulsively. "You take it, partner!" she said.

"It was won with your money, and no one has a greater right to it."

"It is yours," he insisted.

She smiled. "Very well. If it's mine, I give it to you; and if it's yours you share it with me. We are partners, aren't we?

Isn't that what Guy intended?"

He smiled also. "Well--perhaps."

She put it into his hand and closed his fingers over it. "There's no perhaps about it. We'll take it back to Donovan, and make him sell it. And when we've done that--" She paused.

"Yes?" he said.

She pushed her hand through his arm. "Would it bore you very much, partner, to take me back to England--just--for a little while? I want to see my daddy again and tell him how happy I am. He'll like to know."

"Of course I will take you," he said.

"Thank you." Her hand pressed his arm. "And then we'll come back here. I want to come back here, Burke. It isn't--a land of strangers to me any more. It's just--the top of the world. Shall I tell you--would you like me to tell you--how we managed to get here?"

His arm went round her. "I think I know."

She turned her face to his. "By faith--and love, my darling," she said. "There is--no other way. You taught me that."

He kissed her fervently, with lips that trembled. "I love you with my whole soul," he told her, with sudden pa.s.sion. "G.o.d knows how I love you!"

She gave herself to him with a little quivering laugh. "Do you know, partner," she said, "I wanted you to tell me that? I've been wanting it--for ever so long."

And they were nearer to the stars above them in that moment than to the world that lay at their feet.

THE END