Page:Ernest Bramah - Kai Lungs Golden Hours.djvu/142

 and an outcast! How do you disclose yourself!" she exclaimed wildly. "What vile thing has possessed you?"

"One hitherto which now rejects me," replied Weng slowly. "I had thought that here alone I might find a familiar greeting, but that also fails."

"What other seemly course presents itself?" demanded the maiden unsympathetically. "How degrading a position might easily become that of the one who linked her lot with yours if all fit and proper sequences are to be reversed. What menial one might supplant her not only in your affections but also in your Rites? He has defied the Principles!" she exclaimed, as her father entered from behind a screen.

"He has lost his inheritance," muttered the little old man, eyeing him contemptuously. "Weng Cho," he continued aloud, "you have played a double part and crossed our step with only half your heart. Now the past is past and the future an unwritten sheet."

"It shall be written in vermilion ink," replied Weng, regaining an impassive dignity;" and upon that darker half my heart can now be traced two added names."

He had no aim now, but instinct drove him towards the mountains, the retreat of the lost and despairing. A three days' journey lay between. He went forward vacantly, without food and without rest. A falling leaf, as it is said, would have turned the balance of his destiny, and at the wayside village of Li-yong so it chanced. The noisome smell of burning thatch stung his face as he approached, and presently the object came in view. It was the bare cabin of a needy widow