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During the ten days that had passed since he had surprised her—for a few moments—by giving her the release for which she had asked him, only to impose upon her a much stronger obligation, she had been thinking over his trickery—the word had been forced upon her; she felt quite shocked at its persistent intrusion but that made no difference: the word had come and the word remained with her until she was accustomed to it.

But it was not until now that she asked herself the question:

“How could I ever have fancied that I loved the man who could thus juggle with me?”

She knew that what she had told him on that Sunday at Ranelagh was quite true: she had been greatly troubled for some months at the thought that she was guilty of deception—a certain amount of deception—in respect of her engagement to him. The deception of her father and mother had become at last unendurable to her. She began to despise herself for it all and to feel humiliated every time she was by the side of Ernest Clifton when the eyes of people were watching her. She had to act as if he was nothing to her, and this dissimulation had become unendurable, so that she had sought for the opportunity of telling him that he must release her.

She thought that she cared for him even then—she thought that the first step apart from him was taken by her when she perceived that he did not believe what she had said to him at that time. She knew that he did not believe that it pained her to deceive her father and mother—she knew that he was thinking “Who is the other man?” and then she was conscious of taking the first step apart from him.

But it was not a mere step that she had taken away from him on that evening on the Italian terrace of the Kensington garden when she had recovered from her surprise at his generosity only to discover that he had tricked her—that he had substituted a new bondage for the old from which he had released her—it was not a mere step: she became conscious of the fact that he and she were miles asunder—that she detested him so much that she could scarcely realise that she had ever cared a jot for him. And now——

Well now she was irritated that the thought that she had yet to free herself entirely from him, came upon her shattering with a note of discord her crystal dream of peace.

She would write to him—no, she would see him face to face before another day had passed, and tell him that she perceived how he had juggled with her, and that she declined to be bound to him by any tie. It was a comfort to her to reflect that she had need only to tell him to go to her father and ask his consent to her promising to marry him, and her separation from him would be complete, for she knew something of the ambition of her father, and that he had other views respecting her future than to marry her to a man who though perhaps possessing some power as the wire puller—the stage manager, as it were—of a political party, was far from being a match for the daughter of a man who hoped for a peerage. Mr. Clifton himself had been well aware of this fact, or he would not have imposed upon her that bondage of secrecy which had become so irksome to her.

Yes, she would tell him that unless her father gave his consent, she would consider herself bound in no way to him—not even by that subtle silken cord of mutual faith, “mutual confidence holds us together,” was the phrase that he had employed.

She laughed at the thought of it.

“Does it—does it?” she thought, through her laugh. “Well, perhaps—but——”

And then she started, hearing through the hum of the wild bees about the sweet briar of the grassy bank, the sound of a step on the track leading from the stile through the woods. She started and then her face flamed like the poppies at her feet, though she must have seen in a moment that the man who had vaulted over the rails of the stile was no stranger but only Pierce Winwood.

And then he too started and his face—but his face being already the colour of a copper-beech was not susceptible of any poppy tint, although there is an inward blushing, just as there is an inward bleeding—far more fatal than the other.

Then they both laughed, with their heads thrown back, after the manner of people who give themselves over to a laugh.

It seemed that she was under the impression that an apology for her presence there was necessary, for there was more than an explanatory note in her voice while she said:

“I had no idea that—why, I thought that you had gone to Marlow—I was in the garden but there was a horribly crowded steamer with a terrible Hampsteading crowd aboard and a whistle. I came out on the road and was amazed to find that I had never heard that a wheatfield is the most beautiful thing in the world. How is it that the people here have been talking on any other subject during the past few days? What else is there worth talking about in comparison with this?”

She made a motion with her sunshade to include all the landscape. He did not look at the landscape: he was too busy looking at her.

“I wondered what it could be compared to,” she resumed with great rapidity. She did not show her disappointment at his disregard of the glory of mellow growth which he had taken the trouble to indicate. “Oh, what is worthy of being mentioned in the same breath as this?... But how did you come here from that direction?”

“I crossed the river by the bridge and took a stroll through the woods,” said he. “I was not sure that I should find a path through this field, but when I saw the stile I had hopes.”

“That is how people come upon the best things that life has in store for them—by the merest fluke,” said she, and she made a movement as if she understood that they were to walk together to The Weir.

“Don’t let us go away for another minute,” said he, without moving.

She turned her head only, with the sunshade over it. An enquiry was on her face.

“Don’t go away,” he repeated. “I was going to put those words of yours to the test.”

“What words? Did I say anything? Oh, the beauty of the wheatfield? I will not have it analysed by any canon of criticism. If you say that it is too yellow I shall never speak to you again.”

“I will not say that, and yet perhaps you will never speak to me again.”

The smile faded away from her face at the tone of his voice.

“I will listen to you,” she said resolutely.

He looked into her face for a few moments and then he took a step or two away from her, actually turning round to do so. His eyes were fixed on the ground.

“You said that people come upon the best things in life as—as I came here—to you, and I am going to find out whether I have come upon the best or the worst thing that life has to offer me, for I am going to tell you that I love you and to ask you if you can give me any hope that you will one day think of me as loving you.”