The Streets of Ascalon Part 74

Vaguely she was aware of the difference in her att.i.tude toward life since she wrote that letter only a few days before. To what was it due?

To his letter in reply now lying between the leaves of her New Testament on the table beside her? This was his letter:

"Hold out, Strelsa! Matters are going well with me. Your tide, too, will turn before you know it. But neither man nor woman is going to aid you, only time, Strelsa, and--something that neither you nor I have bothered about very much--something that has many names in many tongues--but they all mean the same. And the symbol of what they mean is Truth.

"Why not study it? We never have. All sages of all times have studied it and found comfort; all saints in all ages have found in it strength.

"I find its traces in every ancient picture that I touch. But there are books still older that have lived because of it. And one man died for it--man or G.o.d as you will--the former is more fas.h.i.+onable.

"Lives that have been lived because of it, given for it, forgiven for its sake, are worth our casual study.

"For they say there is no greater thing than Truth. I can imagine no greater. And the search for it is interesting--fascinating--I had no idea how absorbing until recently--until I first saw you, who sent me out into the world to work.

"Hold out--and study this curious subject of Truth for a little while. Will you?

"If you'll only study it a while I promise that it will interest you--not in its formalisms, not in its petty rituals and observances, nor in its endless nomenclature, nor its orthodoxy--but just as you discover it for yourself in the histories of men and women--of saint and sinner--and, above all, in the matchless life of Him who understood them all.

"_Non tu corpus eras sine pectore!_"

Lying there, remembering his letter almost word for word, and where it now lay among printed pages incomprehensible to her except by the mechanical processes of formal faith and superficial observance, she wondered how much that, and the scarcely scanned printed page, might have altered her views of life.

Molly kissed her again and went away downstairs.

When she was dressed in her habit she went out to the lawn's edge where Langly and the horses had already gathered: he put her up, and they cantered away down the wooded road that led to South Linden.

After their first gallop they slowed to a walk on the farther hill slope, chatting of inconsequential things; and it seemed to her that he was in unusually good spirits--almost gay for him--and his short dry laugh rang out once or twice, which was more than she had heard from him in a week.

From moment to moment she glanced sideways at him, curiously inspecting the sleek-headed symmetry of the man, noticing, as always, his perfectly groomed figure, his narrow head and the well-cut lines of the face and jaw. Once she had seen him--the very first time she had ever met him at Miami--eating a broiled lobster. And somehow his healthy appet.i.te, the clean incision of his sun-bronzed jaw and the working muscles, chewing and swallowing, fascinated her; and she never saw him but she thought of him eating vigorously aboard the _Yulan_.

"Langly," she said, "is it going to be disagreeable for you when Mrs.

Ledwith returns to South Linden?"

He looked at her leisurely, eyes, as always, slightly protruding:

"Why?"

"The newspapers."

"Probably," he said.

"Then--what are you going to do about it?"

"About what?"

"The papers."

"Nothing."

"Or--about Mrs. Ledwith?"

"Be civil if I see her."

"Of course," she said, reddening. "I was wondering whether gossip might be nipped in the bud if you left before she arrives and remained away until she leaves."

His prominent eyes were searching her features all the while she was speaking; now they wandered restlessly over the landscape.

"It's my fas.h.i.+on," he said, "to face things as they come."

"If you don't mind I'd rather have you go," she said.

"Where?"

"Anywhere you care to."

He said: "I have told you a thousand times that the thing to do is to take Molly Wycherly 'board the _Yulan_, and----"

"I do not care to do it until our engagement is announced."

"Very well," he said, swinging around in his saddle, "I'll announce it to-day and we'll go aboard this evening and clear out."

"Wh-what!" she faltered.

"There's no use waiting any longer," he said. "Mrs. Ledwith and my fool of an aunt are coming to-morrow. Did you know that? Well, they are. And every dirty newspaper in town will make the matter insidiously significant! If my aunt hadn't taken it into her head to visit Mrs.

Ledwith at this particular moment, there would have been few comments.

As it is there'll be plenty--and I don't feel like putting up with them--I don't propose to for my own sake. The time comes, sooner or later, when a man has got to consider himself."

After a short silence Strelsa raised her gray eyes:

"Has it occurred to you to consider, me, Langly?"

"What? Certainly. Haven't I been doing that ever since we've been engaged----"

"I--wonder," she mused.

"What else have I been doing?" he insisted--"denying myself the pleasure of you when I'm half crazy about you----"

"What!"

A dull flush settled under his prominent cheek-bones: he looked straight ahead of him between his horse's ears as he rode, sitting his saddle like the perfect horseman he was, although his mount felt the savage pain of a sudden and reasonless spurring and the wicked curb scarcely controlled him.

Strelsa set her lips, not looking at either horse or man on her right, nor even noticing her own mare who was cutting up in sympathy with the outraged hunter at her withers.

"Langly?"

"Yes?"

"Has it ever occurred to you how painful such scandalous rumours must be for Mrs. Ledwith?"

"Can I help them?"