Page:Magdalen by J S Machar.pdf/160

 ears Everythiné around them disappeared,—only they remained; that emptiness grew broader and broader, it grew above them and below them, and they were in the midst

He slowly opened his eyelids.

He did not speak a word; he only looked somewhere into the distance, between the branches. Then he gently dropped her hands, and sat a little longer:

"Not yet to-day, but, perhaps, in ten or fourteen days,” he coughed, “it will all be over.”

Tears sparkled in Lucy’s eyes.

He looked a long time at them, as if they were a relief to him “Well, it is a fine sundown,” he whispered softly.

“Is it true,” he suddenly asked in a strong voice, “that you are his mistress?”

“I am not, I am not!”

“Of course,” he again spoke quietly, in apathetic peace, “what difference does it make? To-day the whole town knows your