"Home," she echoed softly.
There was a low knocking at the door behind us. "It is Master
Rolfe's signal," she said. "I must not stay. Tell me that you love
me, and let me go."
I drew her closer to me and pressed my lips upon her bowed head.
"Do you not know that I love you?" I asked.
"Yea," she answered. "I have been taught it. Tell me that you
believe that God will be good to us. Tell me that we shall be happy
yet; for oh, I have a boding heart this day!"
Her voice broke, and she lay trembling in my arms, her face
hidden. "If the summer never comes for us" - she whispered.
"Good-by, my lover and my husband. If I have brought you ruin
and death, I have brought you, too, a love that is very great.
Forgive me and kiss me, and let me go."
"Thou art my dearly loved and honored wife," I said. "My heart
forebodes summer, and joy, and peace, and home."
We kissed each other solemnly, as those who part for a journey
and a warfare. I spoke no word to Rolfe when the door was opened
and she had passed out with her cloak drawn about her face, but
we clasped hands, and each knew the other for his friend indeed.
They were gone, the gaoler closing and locking the door behind
them. As for me, I went back to the settle beneath the window,
and, falling on my knees beside it, buried my face in my arms.
CHAPTER XXIX IN WHICH I KEEP TRYST
THE sun dropped below the forest, blood red, dyeing the river its
own color.
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