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Archie here reappeared with a glass of water.

“The fellow is in a fit,” he reported. “They are taking him away. Jove, Wingarde! You ought to be a dead man. If Nina hadn’t spoilt that shot–“

Nina was shuddering, and he broke off.

“You’d better give up cornering gold fields,” he said lightly. “It seems he was nearly ruined over your last coup. You may do that sort of thing once too often, don’t you know. I shouldn’t chance another throw.”

Nina stood up shakily and looked at her husband.

“If you only would give it up!” she said, with trembling vehemence. “I–I hate money!”

Wingarde made no response; but Archie instantly took her up.

“You only hate money for what it can’t buy,” he said. “You probably expect too much from it. Don’t blame money for that.”

Nina uttered a tremulous laugh that sounded strangely passionate.

“You’re quite right,” she said. “Money’s not everything. I have weighed it in the balance and found it wanting.”

“Yes,” Wingarde said in a peculiar tone. “And so have I.”

XII

AFTERWARDS–LOVE

An overwhelming shyness possessed Nina that night. She dined alone with her husband, and found his silences even more oppressive than usual. Yet, when she rose from the table, an urgent desire to keep him within call impelled her to pause.

“Shall you be late to-night?” she asked him, stopping nervously before him, as he stood by the open door.

“I am not going out to-night,” he responded gravely.”

“Oh!” Nina hesitated still. She was trembling slightly. “Then–I shall see you again?” she said.

He bent his head.

“I shall be with you in ten minutes,” he replied.

And she passed out quickly.

The night was still and hot. She went into her own little sitting-room and straight to the open window. Her heart was beating very fast as she stood and looked across the quiet square. The roar of London hummed busily from afar. She heard it as one hears the rushing of unseen water among the hills.

There was no one moving in the square. The trees in the garden looked dim and dreamlike against a red-gold sky.

Suddenly in the next house, from a room with an open window, there rose the sound of a woman’s voice, tender as the night. It reached the girl who stood waiting in the silence. The melody was familiar to her, and she leant forward breathlessly to catch the words:

Shadows and mist and night,
Darkness around the way;
Here a cloud and there a star;
Afterwards, Day!

There came a pause and the soft notes of a piano. Nina stood with clasped hands, waiting for the second verse. Her cheeks were wet.

It came, slow and exquisitely pure, as if an angel had drawn near to the turbulent earth with a message of healing:

Sorrow and grief and tears,
Eyes vainly raised above;
Here a thorn and there a rose;
Afterwards, Love!

Nina turned from the open window. She was groping, for her eyes were full of tears. From the doorway a man moved quietly to meet her.

“Hereford!” she said in a broken whisper, and went straight into his arms.

He held her fast, so fast that she felt his heart beating against her bowed head. But it was many seconds before he spoke.

“Do you remember the wishing-gate, Nina?” he said, speaking softly. “And how you asked for a Deliverer?”

She stretched up her arms to clasp his neck without lifting her head. She was crying and could not answer him.

He put his hand upon her hair and she felt it tremble.

“Has the Deliverer come to you, dear?” he asked her very tenderly.

He felt for her face in the darkness, and turned it slowly upwards. She did not resist him though she knew well what was coming. Rather she yielded to his touch with a sudden, passionate willingness. And so their lips met in the first kiss that had ever passed between them.

Thus there came a Deliverer more potent than death into the heart of the girl who had married for money, and made its surrender sweet.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: I desire to acknowledge my indebtedness to the Author–I regret to say unknown to me–of the little poem which I have quoted in this story.]