Page:The Fruit of the Tree (Wharton 1907).djvu/281

Rh still to learn that it was Amherst’s way to wrestle with the angel till dawn, and then to go about his other business. Her own mind could revolve in the same grievance as interminably as a squirrel in its wheel, and her husband’s habit of casting off the accepted fact seemed to betoken poverty of feeling. If only he had striven a little harder to keep her—if, even now, he would come back to her, and make her feel that she was more to him than those wretched mills!

When she turned her mare toward Lynbrook, the longing to see Amherst was again uppermost. He had not written for weeks—she had been obliged to tell Maria Ansell that she knew nothing of his plans, and it mortiﬁed her to think that every one was aware of his neglect. Yet, even now, if on reaching the house she should ﬁnd a telegram to say that he was coming, the weight of loneliness would be lifted, and everything in life would seem different.…

Her high-strung mare, scenting the homeward road, and excited by the fantastic play of wayside lights and shadows, swept her along at a wild gallop with which the fevered rush of her thoughts kept pace, and when she reached the house she dropped from the saddle with aching wrists and brain benumbed.

She entered by a side door, to avoid meeting any one, and ran upstairs at once, knowing that she had barely time to dress for dinner. As she opened the door of [ 265 ]