United States or Saint Vincent and the Grenadines ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Now she trusted a good man now she looked up and adored. Her weakness was safe in the care of George Ellesborough's strength. Well, then, let her fight for her love. Presently Janet knocked at the door. The singing downstairs had ceased. "Are you tired, Rachel? Can't I help you?" "Just a bit tired. I'm resting. I'll be down directly." But the interruption had started fresh anxieties in her mind.
And now, in addition, there was the pressure upon her of Ellesborough's own high ideals and religious temper; of the ideals, also, of his family, as he was tenderly and unconsciously revealing them.
He loosened the boy's collar and very gently tried to ease his position. "Mamma!" murmured the boy, with the accent of a miserable child in a bad dream. Ellesborough's face softened. He bent over him and said something in German. Rachel did not understand it only the compassionate look in the man's blue eyes.
The letter in her pocket seemed a living and sinister thing. She had still power to retain it to keep it imprisoned. A lady in the dress of the Women's Forestry Corps appeared on another path leading to Ellesborough's hut. Janet recognized Mrs. Fergusson, and was soon greeted by a shout of welcome. "Well, so Miss Henderson's engaged to our Captain!" said Mrs.
When he arrived she had just come in from the fields where she had been at the threshing machine all day. It had covered her with dirt and chaff; and the process of changing was only half through when she heard the rattle of Ellesborough's cycle outside.
The progress of the affair with Ellesborough made on Janet a curious and rather sinister impression, which she could hardly explain to herself. She seemed to see that Ellesborough's suit steadily advanced; that Rachel made no real attempt to resist his power over her. But all the same there was no happy, spontaneous growth in it.
We collected evidence very easily. I got my divorce eighteen months ago. The decree was made absolute last February. So, of course, I'm quite free quite quite free!" She spoke the last words almost savagely, and after them she moved away to the window looking on the down, and stood gazing through it, as though she had forgotten Ellesborough's presence.
She would have prescribed bed and rest; but Rachel scouted the advice. The alternative was amusement change of scene in Ellesborough's company. Here she was more docile, feverishly submissive and happy, indeed, so long as Ellesborough made the plans, and Ellesborough watched over her. Janet wondered at certain profound changes in her. It was, she saw, the first real passion of Rachel's life.
The vision lasted only a moment. Ellesborough's trained instinct, the wary instinct of the man who had parsed days and nights with nature in her wilder and lonelier places, checked the exclamation on his lips. And before he could move again, the face had disappeared.
Then suddenly a crash of breaking glass a shot. The woman he was holding fell from Ellesborough's arms; he only just caught her. Another shot which grazed his own coat. "Rachel!" It was a cry of horror. Her eyes were closing. But she still smiled at him, as he laid her on the floor, imploring her to speak. There was a stain of blood on the lips, and through them came a few shuddering gasps.
Word Of The Day