"I may cut it down to eight months," she said. "But I must wait that long."

III

A week later Miss Shropshire returned to San Francisco. Nina was not sorry to be alone again. She drifted back into her communion with the inanimate things about her, into the exaltation of spirit, impossible in human companionship, and lived for Thorpe's letters.

One day she received a letter from Dr. Clough.

"DEAR COUSIN NINA," it ran. "I am to have the practice in Napa, but not for two or three months, unfortunately, for I look forward to meeting you again. Those few days with you and Miss Molly were delightful to the lonely wanderer, who has never known a home."

("Not since he wore clogs," thought Nina.) "Perhaps some day I shall make substantial acknowledgment of my grat.i.tude. This is a world of vicissitudes, as we all know. Remember this--will you, Nina?--when you need me _I am there._ There are crises in life when a true friend, a relative whose interests merge with one's own, is not to be despised. Don't destroy this letter. Put it by. It is sincere.

"Your faithful and obd't servant, "RICHARD CLOUGH."

Nina tossed the letter impatiently on the table, then caught it up again and re-read the last pages.

"That sounds as if it were written _avec intention_," she thought. "Can papa be embarra.s.sed? But what good could this scrubby little man do me, if he were? Most likely it is the first gun of the siege. Thank Heaven the guns must be fired through the post for a while."

December was come, but it was still very warm. The lake was hard and still and blue. The glare was merciless.

Nina, followed by a servant bearing cushions, climbed wearily up the hill to the forest. Once or twice she paused and caught at a tree for support.

"If I ever get into the forest, I believe I'll stay there until this weather is over," she thought. "It has completely demoralised me."

The servant arranged the cushions in a hammock between two pines whose arms locked high above,--a green fragrant roof the sun could not penetrate. Nina made herself comfortable, and re-read Thorpe's last letter, received the day before. It was a very impatient letter. He wanted her, and life in the South was a bore after the novelty had worn off.

She lay thinking of him, and listening to the drowsy murmur of forest life about her. Squirrels were chattering softly, somewhere in the arbours above those slender grey pillars. A confused hum rose from the ground; from far came the roar of a torrent. She could see the blue lake with its ring of white sand, the bluer sky above, and turned her back: the sight brought heat into those cool depths. Above her rose the dim green aisles, the countless columns of the forest. She was very tired and languid. She placed Thorpe's letter under her cheek and slept; and in her sleep she dreamed.

She was still in the forest: every lineament of it was familiar. For a time there were none of the changes of dreams. Then from the base of every pine something lifted slowly and coiled about the tree,--something long and green and horridly beautiful. It lifted itself to the very branches, then detached itself a little and waved a foot of its upper length to and fro, its glittering eyes regarding her with sleepy malice. The squirrels had hidden in their caves; not a sound came from the earth; the waters had hushed their voice. Nothing moved in that awful silence but the languid heads of the snakes.

Then came a sudden brisk step; her cousin entered. He did not notice the sleeper, but went to each constrictor in turn and stroked it lovingly.

Once he caught a coil close to his breast and laughed. The small malignant eyes above moved to his, their expression changing to friendliness, albeit shot with contempt. To Nina's agonised sense the scene lasted for hours, during which Clough fondled the reptiles with increasing ardour.

But at last the scene changed, and abruptly. She was on the mountain above the fog-ocean, close to the stars. Thorpe's arms were strong about her. It had seemed to her in the past five months that she had never really ceased to feel the strength of his embrace, to hear the loud beating of his heart on her own. This time he withdrew one arm and, thrusting his fingers among her heartstrings, pulled them gently.

Something vibrated throughout her. She had been happy before, but that soft vibration filled her with a new and inexplicable gladness. She asked him what it meant. He murmured something she could not understand, and smote the chords again. Her being seemed filled with music.

She awoke. The woods were dark. She tried to recall the ugly prelude to her dream, but it had pa.s.sed. She put her hands against her shoulders, fancying she must encounter the arms that had held her, for their pressure lingered. Then she drew her brows together, and craned her neck with an expression of wonder. But several moments pa.s.sed before she understood. She was very ignorant of many things, and her experience up to the present had been exceptional.

But she was a woman, and in time she understood.

Her first mental response was a wild unreasoning terror, that of the woman who is in sore straits, far from the man who should protect her and evoke the hasty sanction of the law. But the mood pa.s.sed. She was sure of Thorpe, and she had all the arrogance of wealth. He would hasten at her summons, and they would live in this solitude for a year or more; no one beyond the necessary confidants need ever know.

The maternal instinct had awakened in her dream. She folded herself suddenly in her own arms. Her imagination flew to the future. Every imaginative woman who loves the man that becomes her husband must have one enduring regret: that in a third or more of his life she had no part; he grew to manhood knowing nothing of her little share in the scheme of things, met her when two at least of his personalities were coffined in the yesterday that is the most vivid of all the memories.

And if his child be a boy, she may fancy it the incarnation of her husband's lost boyhood and youth, and thus complete the circle of her manifold desire.

And then Nina knew what had scotched the monster of heredity; she could see the tiny hands at its throat. She lay and marvelled until the servants, alarmed, came to look for her. The world took on a new and wonderful aspect; she was the most wonderful thing in it.

IV

After supper she went into the sitting-room and wrote to Thorpe. As she finished and left the desk, her eye fell on Richard Clough's letter, which lay, open, on the table. The same chill horror caught her as when she had encountered his searching eyes on the last day of his visit, and she understood its meaning. He knew; there was the key to his verbiage.

She dropped upon a chair, feeling faint and ill. Like many women, she had firm trust in her intuitions. If they had seemed baseless before, they rested on a firm enough foundation now. She was in this man's power; and the man was an adventurer and a Clough. Would he tell her father? Or worse--her mother! She pictured her father's grief; his rage against Thorpe. It would be more than she could endure. When Thorpe came, it would not matter so much. And if her father were not told, it was doubtful if he would ever suspect: he was very busy, and hated the trip from San Francisco to Lake County. After Thorpe's arrival, it was hardly likely that he would visit her.

A few moments' reflection convinced her that Clough would keep her secret. His was the mind of subtle methods. He would make use of his power over her in ways beyond her imagining.

Terror possessed her, and she called loudly upon Thorpe. With the sound of his name, her confidence returned. He would be with her in something under three months. Meanwhile, she could defy Clough. Later, he would meet more than his match.

The next day she wrote to Molly Shropshire, telling her the truth and giving her many commissions. Miss Shropshire's reply was characteristic:

"I have bought everything, and start for the cottage on Tuesday.

It is fortunate that I have two married sisters; I can be of much a.s.sistance to you. I have helped on several wardrobes of this sort, and acquired much lore of which you appear to be painfully ignorant.

I am coming with my large trunk; for I shall not leave you again."

The momentous subject was not broached for some hours after her arrival.

Then--they were seated before the fire in the sitting-room, and the first rain of winter was pelting the roof--Miss Shropshire opened her mouth and spoke with vicious emphasis.

"I hate men. There is not one I'd lift my finger to do a service for. My sisters are supposed to have good husbands. One--Fred Lester--is a grown-up baby, full of whims and petty vanities and blatant selfishness, who has to be 'managed.' Tom Manning is as surly as a bear with a sore head when his dinner disappoints him; and when things go wrong in the office there is no living in the house with him. My brother's life is notorious, and his wife, what with patience and tears, looks like a pan of skim-milk. Catch me ever marrying! Not if Adonis came down and staked a claim about a mountain of gold quartz. As for Dudley Thorpe!" her voice rose to the pitch of fury. "What is a man's love good for, if it can't think of the woman first? Aren't they our natural protectors?

Aren't they supposed to think for us,--take all the responsibilities of life off our shoulders? This sort of thing is in keeping with the character, isn't it? Why don't you hate him? You ought to. _I'd_ murder him--"

Nina plunged across the rug, and pressed both hands against Miss Shropshire's mouth, her eyes blazing with pa.s.sion.

"Don't you dare speak of him like that again! If you do, it will be the last time you will ever speak to me. I understand him--as well as if he were literally a part of myself. I'll never explain to you nor to any one, but _I know_. And there is nothing in me that does not respond to him. Now, do you understand? Will you say another word?"

"Oh, very well. Don't stifle me!" Miss Shropshire released herself.

"Have it that way, if it suits you best. I didn't come here to quarrel with you."

Nina resumed her seat. After a few moments she said: "There is another thing: Richard Clough knows." And she told Miss Shropshire of his letter.

"Um, well, I don't know but that that will be as good an arrangement as any. Some one must attend you, and a relative--"

"What! Do you think I'd have that reptile near me?"

"Now, Nina, look at the matter like a sensible woman. We shall have to get a doctor from Napa. If it storms, he may be days getting here. If he has a wife, she'll want to know where he has been, and will worm it out of him. If he hasn't, he'll let it out some night when he has his feet on the table in his favourite saloon, and is outside his eighth gla.s.s of punch. It will be to Richard's interest to keep the matter quiet--you can make it his interest: I don't fancy he's above pocketing a couple of thousands. And he'll not dare annoy you after Dudley Thorpe is here.

I'll do Dudley Thorpe this much justice: he could whip most men, and he wouldn't stop to think about it, either. Don't let us discuss the matter any further now. Just turn it over in your mind. I am sure you will come to the conclusion that I am right. If you ignore Richard, there's no knowing what he may do."

V

The next day Miss Shropshire cut out many small garments, Nina watching her with ecstatic eyes. Both were expert needlewomen,--most Californian girls were in those days of the infrequent and inferior dressmaker,--and in the weeks that came they fashioned many dainty and elegant garments.