Page:The Snake's Pass (Stoker).djvu/195

 plateau, and climbed the rock, and walked down the boreen on my way for Carnaclif.

And then, and for the first time, did a thought strike me—one which for a moment made my blood run cold—Dick!

Aye—Dick! What about him? It came to me with a shudder, that my happiness—if it should be my happiness—must be based on the pain of my friend. Here, then, there was perhaps a clue to Norah's strange gravity! Could Dick have made a proposal to her? He admitted having spoken to her—why should he, too, not have been impulsive? Why should it not be that he, being the first to declare himself, had got a favourable answer, and that now Norah was not free to choose?

How I cursed the delay in finding her—how I cursed and found fault with everyone and everything! Andy especially came in for my ill-will. He, at any rate, knew that my unknown of the hill-top at Knocknacar was none other than Norah!

And yet, stay! who but Andy persisted in turning my thoughts to Norah, and more than once suggested my paying a visit to Shleenanaher to see her? No! Andy must be acquitted at all points: common justice demanded that. Who, then, was I to blame? Not Andy—not Dick, who was too noble and too loyal a friend to give any cause for such a thought. Had he not asked me at the first if the woman of my fancy was not this very woman; and had he not confessed