They were coming back to-night; but he would not see her till to-morrow....

In his pocket reposed a brief Tara-like note, bidding her 'faithful Knight of the Bracelet' welcome Home. Vainly he delved between the lines of her sisterly affection. Nothing could still the doubt that consumed him, but contact with her hands, her eyes.

For that, and other reasons, the difficult meeting had been followed by a difficult day. They had wandered through the house and garden, very carefully veiling their emotions. They had lounged and smoked in the studio, looking through his father's latest pictures. They had talked of the family. Jeffers would be down to-morrow night, for the week-end; Tiny on Tuesday with the precious Baby; Jerry, distinctly coming round, and eager to see Roy. Even Aunt Jane sounded a shade keen. And he, undeserving, had scarcely expected them to 'turn a hair.' Then they discussed the Indian situation; and Roy--forgetting to be shy--raged at finding how little those at Home had been allowed to realise, to understand.

Not a question, so far, about his rapid on-and-off engagement, for which mercy he was duly grateful. And of her, who dwelt in the foreground and background of their thoughts--not a word.

It would take a little time, Roy supposed, to build their bridge across the chasm of three and a half eventful years. You couldn't hustle a lapsed intimacy. To-morrow things would go better, especially if....

Yet, throughout, he had been touched inexpressibly by his father's un.o.btrusive tokens of pleasure and affection: and now--sitting together with their cigars, in the last of the daylight--things felt easier.

"Dad," he said suddenly, turning his eyes from the garden to the man beside him, who was also its spiritual product. "If I seem a bit stupefied, it's because I'm still walking and talking in a dream; terrified I may wake up and find it's not true! I can't, in a twinkling, adjust the beautiful, incredible _sameness_ of all this, with the staggering changes inside me."

His father's smile had its friendly, understanding quality.

"No hurry, Boy. All your deep roots are here. Change as much as you please, you still remain--her son."

"Yes--that's it. The place is full of her," Roy said very low; and at present they could not trust themselves to say more.

It had not escaped Sir Nevil's notice that the boy had avoided the drawing-room, and had not once been under the twin beeches, his favourite summer retreat. No hammock was slung there now.

After a considerable gap, Roy remarked carelessly: "I suppose they must have got home by now?"

"About an hour ago, to be exact," said Sir Nevil; and Roy's involuntary start moved him to add: "You're not running round there to-night, old man. They'll be tired. So are you. And it's only fair I should have first innings. I've waited a long time for it, Roy."

"_Dads!_" Roy looked at once penitent and reproachful--an engaging trick of schoolroom days, when he felt a scolding in the air. "You never said--you never gave me an idea."

"_You_ never sounded as if the idea would be acceptable."

"Didn't I? Letters are the devil," murmured Roy--all penitence now. "And if it hadn't been for Tara----" He stopped awkwardly. Their eyes met, and they smiled. "Did you know ... she wrote? And that's why I'm here?"

"Well done, Tara! I didn't know. I had dim suspicions. I also had a dim hope that--my picture might tempt you----"

"Oh, it _would_ have--letter or no. It's an inspired thing."--He had already written at length on that score.--"You were mightily clever--the two of you!"

His father twinkled. "That as may be. We had the trifling advantage of knowing our Roy!"

They sat on till all the light had ebbed from the sky and the moon had come into her own. It was still early; but time is the least ingredient of such a day; and Sir Nevil rose on the stroke of ten.

"You look f.a.gged out, old boy. And the sooner you're asleep--the sooner it will be to-morrow! A pet axiom of yours. D'you remember?"

Did he not remember?

They went upstairs together; the great house seemed oppressively empty and silent. On the threshold of Roy's room they said good-night. There was an instant of palpable awkwardness; then Roy--overcoming it--leaned forward and kissed the patch of white hair on his father's temple.

"G.o.d bless you," Sir Nevil said rather huskily. "You ought to sleep sound in there. Don't dream."

"But I love to dream," said Roy; and his father laughed.

"You're not so staggeringly changed inside! As sure as a gun, you'll be late for breakfast!"

And he did dream. The moment his lids fell--she was there with him, under the beeches, their sanctuary--she who all day had hovered on the confines of his spirit, like a light, felt not seen. There were no words between them, nor any need of words; only the ineffable peace of understanding, of reunion....

Dream--or visitation--who could say? To him it seemed that only afterwards sleep came--the dreamless sleep of renewal....

He woke egregiously early: such an awakening as he had not known for months on end. And out there in the garden it was a miracle of a morning: divinely clear, with the mellow clearness of England; ma.s.sed trees, brooding darkly; the lawn all silver-grey with dew; everywhere blurred outlines and tender shadows; pure balm to eye and spirit after the hard brilliance and contrasts of the East.

Madness to get up; yet impossible to lie there waiting. He tried it, for what seemed an endless age: then succ.u.mbed to the inevitable.

While he was dressing, clouds drifted across the blue. A spurt of rain whipped his open cas.e.m.e.nt; threatening him in playful mood. But before he had crept down and let himself out through one of the drawing-room windows, the sky was clear again, with the tremulous radiance of happiness struck sharp on months of sorrow and stress.

Striding, hatless, across the drenched lawn, and resisting the pull of his beech-wood, he pressed on and up to the open moor; craving its sweeps of s.p.a.ce and colour unbosomed to the friendly sky that seemed so much nearer earth than the pa.s.sionate blue vault of India.

It was five years since he had seen heather in bloom--or was it five decades? The sight of it recalled that other July day, when he had tramped the length of the ridge with his head full of dreams and the ache of parting in his heart.

To him, that far-off being seemed almost another Roy in another life.

Only--as his father had feelingly reminded him--the first Roy and the last were alike informed by the spirit of one woman; visible then, invisible now; yet sensibly present in every haunt she had made her own.

The house was full of her; the wood was full of her. But the pangs of reminder he had so dreaded resolved themselves, rather, into a sense of indescribable, ethereal reunion. He asked nothing better than that his life and work should be fulfilled with her always: her and Tara--if she so decreed....

Thought of Tara revived impatience, and drew his steps homeward again.

Strolling back through the wood, he came suddenly upon the open s.p.a.ce where he had found the Golden Tusks, and lingered there a little--remembering the storm and the terror and the fight; Tara and her bracelet; and the deep unrealised significance of that childish impulse, inspired by _her_, whose was the source of all their inspirations. And now--seventeen years afterwards, the bracelet had drawn him back to them both; saved him, perhaps, from the unforgiveable sin of throwing up the game.

On he walked, along the same mossy path, almost in a dream. He had found the Tusks. His High-Tower Princess was waiting--his 'Star far-seen.'

Again, as on that day--he came unexpectedly in view of their tree: and--wonder of wonders (or was it the most natural thing on earth?), there was Tara herself, approaching it by another path that linked the wood with the grounds of the black-and-white house, which was part of the estate.

Instantly he stepped back a pace and stood still, that he might realise her before she became aware of him:--her remembered loveliness, her new dearness.

Loveliness was the quintessence of her. With his innate feeling for words, he had never--even accidentally--applied it to Rose. Had she, too, felt impatient? Was she coming over to breakfast for a 'surprise'?

At this distance, she looked not a day older than on that critical occasion, when he had realised her for the first time; only more fragile--a shade too fragile. It hurt him. He felt responsible. And again, to-day--very clever of her--she was wearing a delphinium blue frock; a shady hat that drooped half over her face. No pink rose, however--and he was thankful. Roses had still a too baleful a.s.sociation.

He doubted if he could ever tolerate a Marechal Niel again--as much on account of Lance, as on account of the other.

Tara was wearing his flower--sweet-peas, palest pink and lavender. And, at sight of her, every shred of doubt seemed burnt up in the clear flame of his love for her:--no heady confusion of heart and senses, but a rarefied intensity of both, touched with a coal from the altar of creative life. The knowledge was like a light hand reining in his impatience. Poet, no less than lover, he wanted to go slowly through the golden mist....

But the moment he stirred, she heard him; saw him....

No imperious gesture, as before; but a lightning gleam of recognition, of welcome and--something more----?

He hurried now....

Next instant, they were together, hands locked, eyes deep in eyes. The surface sense of strangeness between them, the undersense of intimate nearness--thrilling as it was--made speech astonishingly difficult.

"Tara," he said, just above his breath.