"Are you, really? That's a charming confession to hear from one's wife. You look different to-night, Ladybird. What's come to you?"

"I don't know," she murmured truthfully; adding so low that he could barely catch the words, "Only--I don't seem ever to have understood--till just now how much--I really care----"

"Why,--_Evelyn_!"

Sheer surprise checked further speech, and with a man's instinctive sense of reserve he looked hastily round to make sure that they were alone.

She misread his silence, and slipped a hand under his arm.

"You're not angry, are you--that I--didn't understand sooner?"

"Good heavens, no!"

"Then come--please come. Honor gave me the whole dance.

Besides--look!--there she goes with Major Wyndham. She's always happy with him!"

Desmond smiled. "That's true enough. No need for us if Paul is in the field. Come this way, Ladybird. I know the Lawrence Hall of old."

They sought and found a sofa in a retired, shadowy corner.

"That's ever so nice," she said simply. "Sit down there."

He obeyed, and there was a momentary silence between them. Then the emotion astir within her swept all before it. Turning suddenly, she flung both arms round his neck and hid her face upon his shoulder, her breath coming in short, dry sobs, like the breath of an overwrought child.

Very tenderly, as one who touches that which he fears to bruise or break, he drew her close to him, his own pulses quickened by a remembrance of the words that gave the clue to her strange behaviour, and during those few minutes between dance and dance, Evelyn Desmond arrived at a truer knowledge of the man she had married, in the girlish ignorance of mere fascination, than two years of life with him had brought to her half-awakened heart.

BOOK II.

"In the reproof of chance Lies the true proof of men."

--SHAKESPEARE.

CHAPTER XVII.

YOU WANT TO GO!

"White hands cling to the tightened rein, Slipping the spur from the booted heel, Tenderest voices cry 'Turn again!'

Red lips tarnish the scabbarded steel.

High hopes faint on a warm hearth-stone; He travels the fastest who travels alone."

--KIPLING.

For the first six weeks of the new year life flowed serenely enough in the bungalow on the mound.

Relieved of the greater part of her burden, and re-established in her husband's heart, Evelyn Desmond blossomed like a flower under the quickening influences of spring. Light natures develop best in sunshine: and so long as life asked no hard things of her, Evelyn could be admirably sweet-tempered and self-forgetful--even to the extent of curbing her weakness for superfluous hats and gloves and shoes. A genuine sacrifice, this last, if not on a very high plane.

But the limits of such natures are set, and their feats of virtue or vice must be judged accordingly.

To Honor, whose very real sympathy was infallibly tinged with humour, the bearing of this regenerate Evelyn suggested a spoilt child who, having been scolded and forgiven, is disposed to be heroically, ostentatiously good till next time; and her goodness at least was whole-hearted while it lasted. She made a genuine effort to handle the reins of the household: waxed zealous over Theo's socks and shirts; and sang to his accompaniment in the evenings. Her zest for the tennis-courts waned. She joined Frank and Honor in their frequent rides to the polo-ground, and Kresney found himself unceremoniously discarded like a programme after a dance.

Wounded vanity did not improve his temper, and the ever-present Linda suffered accordingly. For Kresney, though little given to the weakness of generosity, never failed to share his grievances liberally with those about him.

"What is this that has come to little Mrs Desmond?" he demanded one evening on a querulous note of injury. "Whenever I ask her to play tennis now she always manages to be engaged. I suppose, because they have won that confounded Punjab Cup, she thinks she must give herself airs like the rest of them. But I tell you what, Linda, we have got to make her understand that she is not going to get money out of us, and then chuck us in the dirt like a pair of old gloves,--you see? You must tell her you are in a hole now, because of that three hundred rupees; that you have been forced to get cash from me to go on with, and to let me know about your little business with her; and you are afraid I may refer the matter to her husband. It would bring his cursed pride down with a run if he knew that his wife had practically borrowed money from me, and he could say nothing against _us_ for helping her. It is she who would suffer; and I am not keen to push her into a hot corner if she can be made to behave decently enough to suit me. So just let her know that I will make no trouble about it so long as she is friendly, like she used to be. Then you can ask her to tea; and I bet you five rupees she accepts on the spot!"

Meantime Evelyn Desmond went on her way, in ignorance of the forces that were converging to break up her newly-gotten peace of mind. For the time being her world was filled and bounded by her husband's personality. The renewal of his tenderness and his trust in her eclipsed all the minor troubles of life: and with the unthinking optimism of her type she decided that these would all come right somehow, some time, sooner or later.

What Desmond himself thought did not transpire. Evelyn's happiness gave him real satisfaction; and if he were already beginning to be aware that his feeling for her left the innermost depths of his nature unstirred, he never acknowledged the fact. A certain refinement of loyalty forbade him to discuss his wife, even with himself. Her ineffectualness and the clinging quality of her love made an irresistible appeal to the vein of chivalry which ran, like a thread of gold, through the man's nature; and if he could not forget, he could at least try not to remember, that her standard of uprightness differed widely and radically from his own.

When Kresney's tactics resulted in a partial revival of her friendliness towards him, Desmond accepted the fact with the best grace he could muster. Since his promise to the man made definite objection impossible, he decided that the matter must be left to the disintegration of time; and if Kresney could have known how the necessity chafed Desmond's pride and fastidiousness of spirit, the knowledge would have added relish to his enjoyment of Evelyn's society.

Thus the pa.s.sing of uneventful days brought them to the middle of February--to the end of the short, sharp Northern winter, and the first far-off whisper of the wrath to come; brought also to Honor Meredith a sudden perception that her year with the Desmonds was very nearly at an end. John's latest letter announced that he hoped to get back to the life and work he loved by the middle of April; and the girl read that letter with such strangely mixed feelings that she was at once puzzled and angered by her own seeming inconsistency. John had always stood unquestionably first in her life. It would be altogether good to have him with her again--to be able to devote herself to him entirely as she had dreamed of doing for so many years. And yet....

There was no completing the broken sentence, which, for some unaccountable reason, ended in a sigh.

Honor was sitting at the time in her favourite corner of the drawing-room, on a low settee constructed out of an empty case, cunningly hid, and ma.s.sed with cushions of dull red and gold. As her lips parted in that unjustifiable sigh she looked round at the familiar pictures and hangings; at Desmond's well-worn chair, and the table beside it with his pipe-rack, a photo of his father, and half a dozen favourite books; at the graceful outline of Evelyn's figure where she stood by the wide mantelshelf arranging roses in a silver bowl, her head tilted to one side, a shaft of sunlight from one of the slits of windows, fifteen feet up the wall, turning her soft fair hair to gold.

From Evelyn's figure, Honor's glance travelled to the photograph of Desmond on the piano, and lingered there with a softened thoughtfulness of gaze. What deep roots she had struck down into the lives of these two since her first sight of that picture! A year ago the man had been a mere name to her; and now----

The clatter of hoofs, followed by Desmond's voice in the verandah, snapped the thread of her thought, and roused Evelyn from the contemplation of her roses.

"Theo _is_ back early!" she exclaimed: and on the words he entered the room, elation in every line of him, an unusual light in his eyes.

"What _has_ happened to make you look like that?" she asked. "Somebody left you a fortune?"

Desmond laughed, with a peculiar ring of enjoyment.

"No fear! Fortunes don't grow hereabouts! But we've had stirring news this morning. A big party of Afridis has crossed the Border and fired a village, murdering and looting cattle and women on a very daring scale. The whole garrison is under orders for a punitive expedition.

We shall be off in ten days, if not sooner."

Evelyn's colour ebbed while he was speaking, and she made a quick movement towards him. But Desmond taking her shoulders between his hands, held her at arm's length, and confronted her with steadfastly smiling eyes.

"No, no, Ladybird--you're going to be plucky and stand up to this like a soldier's wife, for my sake. The Frontier's been abnormally quiet these many months. It will do us all good to have a taste of real work for a change."

"Do you mean ... will there be much ... fighting?"

"Well--the Afridis don't take a blow sitting down. We have to burn their crops, you see; blow up their towers; enforce heavy fines, and generally knock it into their heads that they can't defy the Indian Government with impunity. Yes; it means fighting--severe or otherwise, according to their pleasure."

"Pleasure!--It sounds simply horrible; and you--I believe you're _glad_ to go!"

"Well, my dear, what else would you have? Not because I'm murderously inclined," he added smiling. "Every soldier worth his salt is glad of a chance to do the work he's paid for. But that's one of the things I shall never teach you to understand!"

Evelyn turned hurriedly back to her roses. Her throat felt uncomfortably dry, and two tears had escaped in spite of herself.