Leonie of the Jungle Part 32

"You don't know what you are saying!" she replied. "It is criminal even to think of such a thing--mad as I believe I am--mad as I shall be when I end in a padded room!"

Her voice was barely a whisper, but it cut like slate on slate, and her eyes stared straight ahead as she continued speaking rapidly, almost uncontrollably, and yet with a certain air of relief as though glad to give vent in words to the horror which pressed upon her brain.

"Although you pretend it is only sleep-walking," she went on, heedless of his efforts to interrupt her, "you know perfectly well there is something wrong with me. You know it, so did your father, so does Auntie, people here are whispering it. Yes! they are, they _are_," she reiterated, "and they are _right_. Something more than just being frightened by my ayah happened to me in India all those years ago, oh!

you know it did, I'm under a spell or bewitched--sometimes I have a--a--" she struck her forehead with her open hand as she crouched back upon the bench like some animal at bay--"a--oh! my G.o.d--you see--I cannot even say what it is. Can't you tell me, Jan? Can't you help me? _You_--you say you love me--you say you have found a clue--for pity's sake follow it, follow it and save me--you--you----"

"Leonie, _look_ at me!"

Something in his voice forced her to look at him, and her eyes shone like flat pieces of opalescent gla.s.s so contracted were the pupils, but they widened even as she looked into the steadfast grey eyes, and her mouth relaxed into the shadow of a smile.

Good heavens, why didn't he take her in his arms and smother her up against his heart, or put a bag over her head, or failing the bag, put his hand before her eyes?

What fools some men can be with the woman they love within their reach.

But instead he left her, hurt and humiliated and desolate, to sit half crouched by herself, whilst her eyes, against all striving, slowly veered round to the shrub.

He held her hand, it is true, whilst he talked, but what good is _that_ to a frightened woman whose heart is crying for protection, and whose body is clamouring to be forced into submission?

"Dear," he said as Leonie stared at the poinsettia bush, "I am on the track at last, and in a very little time shall know exactly what happened to you all those years ago. There is only one link missing, and that I shall surely find, as I find everything when I set my mind to it. Then the whole thing will be cleared up, and this mysterious cloud lifted from you. Look at me, dear!" Leonie turned and looked at him blankly, and as he continued speaking, slowly, and as though against her will, turned her eyes back to the poinsettia bush. "I want you now in your distress. I want you in the storm as well as in the sunshine, dear; I love to see you smile, it would be heaven to _make_ you smile. Marry me, beloved, _now_. Dear, won't you? Let me lift the cloud from my _wife_. Oh! Leonie, think of it--my _wife_!"

Leonie answered mechanically, as though she were repeating a lesson and had not heard one word of the man's pleading.

"What have you found out? And what is missing?"

"I have found the woman who was your ayah."

Leonie pulled her hands away, and pushing the hair off her forehead, sat quite still listening, but not hearing the music as it floated through the night air, watching without seeing the couples as they strolled about the grounds.

And then she answered, but without any real interest, although very distinctly, shivering slightly as the man put the wrap over her bare shoulders.

"Have you? And who is she, really? Of course I know her name--but--but what do you know about her? I have had no answer to my letters since I've been out here, is the poor thing still working?"

"She's--not exactly working for a living, dear, and she is--is----"

He stopped short with a world of perplexity in his eyes, then went on as slowly and mechanically as Leonie had done.

"Perhaps, dear, I--I had--better not say any more until--until I have everything quite clear."

And he drew his hand sharply across his eyes as Leonie sighed.

"Very well!" she replied gently. "Just as you think best."

"Tell me you love me, Leonie, let me be sure of that, let me just hear you say it once."

She put out both her hands, and he took them and kissed them.

"Dear, do you count me as _so_ little? Don't you know, cannot you feel that a love like mine endures for ever?"

"Do you still want the little white house behind the white wall--Leonie, _do_ you!"

"Oh! Jan!"

"Well, marry me--marry me, beloved, and give me the right to protect you--from trouble, and these slanderous, murderous tongues."

Leonie's face was lovely to behold, swept by a wave of colour, and with eyes like stars; but she shook her head although a little smile parted the crimson mouth.

"No! Jan! Nothing will make me change. Not until we know and until I am cured. Do you think I would risk our love, and our happiness? I shall never, never marry you as long as I have this--this longing to--this desire to--to--oh! what is it. Find out what has happened to me, find out what I do when I walk in my sleep--just how mad I am, and if the madness can be cured, and if it can, _then_ I will--will----"

"Yes, dear?"

"I will--will----!"

It was no pretty sight to watch her striving to speak, her mouth opening and shutting without sound, her hands against her throat.

Then she looked at him suddenly, smiling sweetly, and put both hands in his, while he, sick with pain and unconfessed fear, changed the conversation abruptly by the grace of understanding.

"I think you ought to go away, Leonie--to the hills--for a change.

It's getting frightfully hot, why don't you?"

"Yes!--I might--I think I will--I'm so tired of everything--so very--very tired!"

"Where to, dear?"

Leonie bent her head a little sideways as though listening, made a strange little movement with both her hands, then placed the open palms against her forehead and replied:

"To Benares!"

She had barely whispered the words, so quietly did she speak, as the poinsettia flowers bent slightly--to a pa.s.sing breeze--may be!

CHAPTER x.x.xIII

"Dona praesentis cape laetus horae, ac Lingue severa."--_Horace_.

Leonie's first long-distance journey was just like other people's first long-distance journey in India.

And being of the type which revels in the new and unknown, she loved it.

Who wouldn't!

The seething ma.s.ses of dusky humanity enchanted her; she delighted in the glaring colouring, the clank of the holy man's chains, the incessant call of the water carrier and sweetmeat vendor, and the clang of iron on iron which announces the train's departure.

She absolutely thrilled on disrobing the first night in the little bathroom while her ayah spread her sheets and pillows and blankets upon the lower berth; and when her bodywoman disappeared through the door leading to the servants' compartment, she lay for a time watching the stars, and the glimmer of pa.s.sing mosque, or temple, or tomb.

Then she laughed aloud in sheer content, wedged Jan Cuxson's box of chocolate biscuits safely into the side of the bunk, and turned to the side table to look for light literature in the shape of a magazine.