Page:The Prussian officer, and other stories, Lawrence, 1914.djvu/177

 She looked dreamily across to the open fields that slept in the sun.

“I have a lover as well, you know,” she said, with assurance, yet dropping again almost into the intimate tone.

This woke in him the spirit to fight her.

“I think I met him. He is good-looking—also in Arcady.”

Without answering, she turned into a dark path that led up-hill, where the trees and undergrowth were very thick.

“They did well,” she said at length, “to have various altars to various gods, in old days.”

“Ah yes!” he agreed. “To whom is the new one?”

“There are no old ones,” she said. “I was always looking for this.”

“And whose is it?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” she said, looking full at him.

“I’m very glad, for your sake,” he said, “that you are satisfied.”

“Aye—but the man doesn’t matter so much,” she said. There was a pause.

“No!” he exclaimed, astonished, yet recognizing her as her real self.

“It is one’s self that matters,” she said. “Whether one is being one’s own self and serving one’s own God.”

There was silence, during which he pondered. The path was almost flowerless, gloomy. At the side, his heels sank into soft clay.