Page:The further side of silence (IA furthersideofsil00clifiala).pdf/34

 afternoon, these two set out upon the oldest and newest of all pilgrimages.

With the strong current aiding them, they had only a journey of a few hours to make, a time short enough for any lovers' transit, though Kria was busy steering the boat, and Pi-Noi sat in the bows helping to direct its course by an occasional timely punt. He had won his heart's desire, and the home to which he was bearing his love lay close at hand; yet even during this honeymoon journeying down the clear, rapid-beset river and through the heart of that magnificent wilderness of woodland, Kria had leisure in which to experience the assaults of a mysterious and perplexing jealousy. He was as utterly alone with the girl as if they two were the first or the last of their kind to wander across the face of the earth; yet he had an uneasy consciousness that Pi-Noi had companions, invisible and inaudible to him, in whose presence he knew himself to be de trop. In spite of her silence and immobility, he knew instinctively that always she was holding intimate commune with animate nature in a language which had its beginning upon the further side of silence. It was not only a tongue which he could not hear. It seemed to cleave an abyss between them; to wrench her from his grasp ere ever he had securely won her; to lift her out of his life; to leave him yearning after her with piteous, imploring face upturned and impotent, outstretched arms.

Suddenly the thought of this girl's elusiveness shook him with a panic that checked his heartbeats.