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Rachel tried to say "I am not," but the words would not come. She was jealous, jealous of the past, cut to the heart every time she noticed that Lady Newhaven's hair waved over her ears, and that she had taper fingers. "I think it is no use talking of this any more," Rachel said. "Perhaps I was wrong to speak of it at all. I did as I would be done by.
I knew it long before he spoke of it, but just because he risked losing me by owning it I loved and trusted him all the more. I thought he was, at any rate, an upright man. After Lord Newhaven's death he asked me to marry him, and I accepted him. And when we were talking quietly one day" Rachel's face became, if possible, whiter than before "I told him that I knew of the drawing of lots.
She was amazed at first at the Pratts calling her by her Christian name without her leave, until she discovered that they spoke of the whole county by their Christian names, even designating Lord Newhaven's two younger brothers with whom they were not acquainted as Jack and Harry, though they were invariably called by their own family John and Henry.
A great peace seemed to pervade the long, dim lines of the gardens, and to be gathered into the solemn arches of the ruins against the darkening sky. Through the low door-way a faint light of welcome peered. As she drove up she was aware of two tall figures pacing amicably together in the dusk. As she passed them she heard Lord Newhaven's low laugh at something his companion said.
At the sight of her a sudden passion of anger shot up and enveloped him as in one flame from head to foot. His love for Rachel was a weapon, and he used it. He did not greatly care about his own good name, but the good name of the man whom Rachel loved was a thing to fight for. It was for her sake, not Lady Newhaven's, that he had concocted the story of the mistaken rooms.
It's a horrible shame!" "Oh, well, he has great recuperative power," said I. "She'd better be careful, though. It's a very dangerous game. How do you suppose Lord Newhaven likes it?" Accident gave me that very day a hint how little Lord Newhaven liked it, and a glimpse of the risk Miss Trix was running. Entering the library suddenly, I heard Newhaven's voice raised above his ordinary tones.
But if she had withdrawn from him, however gently, in the moment when her tenderness had, for the first time, vanquished her natural reserve, if she had taken herself away then, he could not have borne it. In deep repentance after Lord Newhaven's death, he had vowed that from that day forward he would never deviate again from the path of truth and honor, however difficult it might prove.
If he could have died then he would have died cheerfully, gladly, as he saw Cassius die by his own hand, counting death the little thing it is. Afterwards, as he stood in the crowd near the door, where the rain was delaying the egress, he saw suddenly Lord Newhaven's face watching him. His heart leaped.
A swift spasm passed over Hugh's face, and a tiger glint leaped into Lord Newhaven's eyes, fixed intently upon him. There was a brief second in which Hugh's mind wavered, as the flame of a candle wavers in a sudden draught. Lord Newhaven's eyes glittered. He advanced the lighters an inch nearer. If he had not advanced them that inch Hugh thought afterwards that he would have refused to draw.
There was in his manner a boundless reverent adoration that was to Lady Newhaven's jealousy as a match to gunpowder. Rachel kept his hand. "Are you sure you want him, Rachel?" gasped Lady Newhaven, holding convulsively to a chair for support. "He has cast me aside. He will cast you aside next, for he is a coward and a traitor. Are you sure you want to marry him? His hands are red with blood.
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