The Lamp in the Desert Part 25

Through the jungle solitudes there came the call of an owl, weird and desolate and lonely. Something in it pierced her with a curious pain.

Was freedom then everything? Did she truly love the silence above all?

She drew her cloak closer about her. Was there something of a chill in the atmosphere? Or was it the chill of the desert beyond the oasis that awaited her?

They emerged from the thickest part of the jungle into a s.p.a.ce of tangled shrubs that seemed fighting with each other for possession of the way. The road was rough, and Monck slackened speed.

"We shall have to leave the car," he said. "There is a track here that leads to the ruined palace. It is only a hundred yards or so. We shall have to do it on foot."

They descended. The moonlight poured in a flood all about them. They were alone.

Stella turned up the narrow path he indicated, but in a moment he overtook her. "Let me go first!" he said.

He pa.s.sed her with the words and walked ahead, holding the creepers back from her as she followed.

She suffered him silently, with a strange sense of awe, almost as though she trod holy ground. But the old feeling of trespa.s.s was wholly absent.

She had no fear of being cast forth from this place that she was about to enter.

The path began to widen somewhat and to ascend. In a few moments they came upon a crumbling stonewall crossing it at right angles.

Monck paused. "One way leads to the palace, the other to the temple," he said. "Which shall we take?"

Stella faced him in the moonlight. She thought he looked stern. "Is not the picnic to be at the palace?" she said.

"Yes." He answered her without hesitation. "You will find Lady Harriet and Co. there. The temple on the other hand is probably deserted."

"Ah!" His meaning flashed upon her. She stood a second in indecision.

Then "Is it far?" she said.

She saw his faint smile for an instant. "A very long way--for you," he said.

"I can come back?" she said.

"I shall not prevent you." She heard the smile in his voice, and something within her thrilled in answer.

"Let us go then!" she said.

He turned without further words and led the way.

They entered the shadow of the jungle once more. For a s.p.a.ce the path ran beside the crumbling wall, then it diverged from it, winding darkly into the very heart of the jungle. Monck walked without hesitation. He evidently knew the place well.

They came at length upon a second clearing, smaller than the first, and here in the centre of a moonlit s.p.a.ce there stood the ruined walls of a little native temple or mausoleum.

A flight of worn, marble steps led to the dark arch of the doorway.

Monck stretched a hand to his companion, and they ascended side by side.

A bubbling murmur of water came from within. It seemed to fill the place with gurgling, gnomelike laughter. They entered and Monck stood still.

For a s.p.a.ce of many seconds he neither moved nor spoke. It was almost as if he were waiting for some signal. They looked forth into the moonlight they had left through the cave-like opening. The air around them was chill and dank. Somewhere in the darkness behind them a frog croaked, and tiny feet scuttled and scrambled for a few moments and then were still.

Again Stella shivered, drawing her cloak more closely round her. "Why did you bring me to this eerie place?" she said, speaking under her breath involuntarily.

He stirred as if her words aroused him from a reverie. "Are you afraid?"

he said.

"I should be--- by myself," she made answer. "I don't think I like India at too close quarters. She is so mysterious and so horribly ruthless."

He pa.s.sed over the last two sentences as though they had not been uttered. "But you are not afraid with me?" he said.

She quivered at something in his question. "I am not sure," she said. "I sometimes think that you are rather ruthless too."

"Do you know me well enough to say that?" he said.

She tried to answer him lightly. "I ought to by this time. I have had ample opportunity."

"Yes," he said rather bitterly. "But you are prejudiced. You cling to a preconceived idea. If you love me--it is in spite of yourself."

Something in his voice hurt her like the cry of a wounded thing. She made a quick, impulsive movement towards him. "Oh, but that is not so!"

she said. "You don't understand. Please don't think anything so--so hard of me!"

"Are you sure it is not so?" he said. "Stella! Stella! Are you sure?"

The words pierced her afresh. She suddenly felt that she could bear no more. "Oh, please!" she said. "Oh, please!" and laid a quivering hand upon his arm. "You are making it very difficult for me. Don't you realize how much better it would be for your own sake not to press me any further?"

"No!" he said; just the one word, spoken doggedly, almost harshly. His hands were clenched and rigid at his sides.

Almost instinctively she began to plead with him as one who pleads for freedom. "Ah, but listen a moment! You have your life to live. Your career means very much to you. Marriage means hindrance to a man like you. Marriage means loitering by the way. And there is no time to loiter. You have taken up a big thing, and you must carry it through.

You must put every ounce of yourself into it. You must work like a galley slave. If you don't you will be--a failure."

"Who told you that?" he demanded.

She met the fierceness of his eyes unflinchingly. "I know it. Everyone knows it. You have given yourself heart and soul to India, to the Empire. Nothing else counts--or ever can count now--in the same way. It is quite right that it should be so. You are a builder, and you must follow your profession. You will follow it to the end. And you will do great things,--immortal things." Her voice shook a little. "But you must keep free from all hampering burdens, all private cares. Above all, you must not think of marriage with a woman whose chief desire is to escape from India and all that India means, whose sympathies are utterly alien from her, and whose youth has died a violent death at her hands. Oh, don't you see the madness of it? Surely you must see!"

A quiver of deep feeling ran through her words. She had not meant to go so far, but she was driven, driven by a force that would not be denied.

She wanted him to see the matter with her eyes. Somehow that seemed essential now. Things had gone so far between them. It was intolerable now that he should misunderstand.

But as she ceased to speak, she abruptly realized that the effect of her words was other than she intended. He had listened to her with a rigid patience, but as her words went into silence it seemed as if the iron will by which till then he had held himself in check had suddenly snapped.

He stood for a second or two longer with an odd smile on his face and that in his eyes which startled her into a momentary feeling that was almost panic; then with a single, swift movement he bent and caught her to him.

"And you think that counts!" he said. "You think that anything on earth counts--but this!"

His lips were upon hers as he ended, stopping all protest, all utterance. He kissed her hotly, fiercely, holding her so pressed that above the wild throbbing of her own heart she felt the deep, strong beat of his. His action was pa.s.sionate and overwhelming. She would have withstood him, but she could not; and there was that within her that rejoiced, that exulted, because she could not. Yet as at last his lips left hers, she turned her face aside, hiding it from him that he might not see how completely he had triumphed.

He laughed a little above her bent head; he did not need to see.

"Stella, you and I have got to sink or swim together. If you won't have success with me, then I will share your failure."

She quivered at his words; she was clinging to him almost without knowing it. "Oh, no! Oh, no!" she said.

His hand came gently upwards and lay upon her head. "My dear, that rests with you. I have sworn that marriage to me shall not mean bondage. If India is any obstacle between us, India will go."