Page:Hard-pan; a story of bonanza fortunes (IA hardpanbonanza00bonnrich).pdf/290

278 concealed by its foliage. He could not see whether the figure was that of a man or woman, could only trace the outline of a form through the darkness and rain. Whoever it was, he had not been heard,—the fall of the rain muffling other sounds,—and he was now close at hand. As he stood, undecided whether to pass on or turn back, the figure made a stealthy movement with its arm—appeared to part the flexible jasmine branches and through the aperture look at the house. The head was thus presented to Gault in partial profile, spotted over with the moving lights that filtered between the leaves. He saw it was a woman's, crowned with some sort of small, close hat. She seemed to be watching the house. The light caught the curve of her cheek; it was gleaming with moisture.

"She must be soaking," he thought, "with no umbrella," and made a step forward.

She heard and started, and, still mechanically holding the branches back, turned and looked at him. For one moment, like a memory from another life, he saw her face in the light.

"Viola!" he cried, as a man might cry to whom the beloved dead stood suddenly revealed.

She gave a gasping ejaculation and let go the branches. In the sudden blotting out of the light he lost her, and, in his terror and superstitious dread, he thought he had seen a vision.