"BLOOD CALLS ALOUD FOR BLOOD AND NOT FOR HANDS ENTWINED"
It was with a strange conflict of feelings that Paul, with Adrea
by his side, passed across the square, low hall of the cottage,
plentifully decorated with stags' heads and other sporting trophies,
and into the drawing-room. It was a room which had been built, too, of
quaint shape, made up of nooks and corners and recesses, and with dark
oak beams stretching right across the ceiling. The furniture was all
old-fashioned, and of different periods; but the general effect was
harmonious, though a trifle shabby. Paul knew it well! Many an evening
he had come in to tea there, after a cigar and a chat with the old
Major, and lounged in that low chair by Mrs. Harcourt's side. But it
scarcely seemed like the same room to him now. The Major and his wife
had been old-fashioned people, and their personality, and talk, and
surroundings, had created a sort of atmosphere which Paul had grown
almost to associate with the place. He missed it directly he entered
the room. What it was that had worked the change it was hard to tell.
Adrea had been far too charmed with its quaintness to seriously alter
anything. A little stiffness in the arrangement of the furniture had
been corrected, and the few antimacassars carefully removed; otherwise
nothing had been changed. The great bowls of yellow roses and
chrysanthemums, and the piles of modern books and music lying about,
might have been partly responsible for it; and the faint perfume which
he had grown to associate altogether with Adrea, and which seemed
wafted into the air as she gathered up her skirts on her way into
the room, had a foreign flavour in it. But, after all, it was Adrea
herself who changed the atmosphere so completely. She was so different
from other women in her strange Eastern beauty and the leopard-like
grace of her movements that she could not fail to create an atmosphere
around her. Yes! it was she herself who had worked the change; just as
she had worked so wonderful a change in him, Paul told himself.
At first they had thought that the room was empty; and Adrea, who had
entered a little in advance, turned round to Paul and held out her
hands with a sudden sweeping gesture of invitation. Even in that
moment, as he moved towards her, Paul had time to feel a quick glow
of admiration at the artistic elegance of her pose and colouring. Her
proud, dusky face and brilliant eyes found a perfect background in the
deep orange of her loose gown, and the velvet twined amongst her dark
hair. Her arms, stretched out towards him, were half bare, where the
lace had fallen back, and a world of passionate love and invitation
was glowing in her face as she leaned slightly towards him, as if
impatient of his slow advance. But before his hands had touched hers,
a voice from the further end of the room had broken in upon that
eloquent silence.
"Adrea! you did not see me!"
They stood for a moment as though paralysed; then Adrea turned
slowly round with darkening face. "I did not! I thought that you were
upstairs!"
She glided out of the shadows, a slim, tall figure dressed with
curious simplicity, and with white, bloodless face. "I am going away,"
she said, coming quite close to them, and fixing her full, deep
eyes upon Adrea; "I am going away at once. But, Adrea, there is one
word--just one word--"
"Say it!" Adrea interrupted impatiently.
She glanced at Paul. He made a movement as though to quit the room,
but Adrea prevented him. "You need not go!" she said. "Anything that
is to be said can be said to you as well as to me. I prefer to have no
secrets! You were going to say something to me," she added, turning to
her companion.
"Yes! I have no objection to say it before Mr. de Vaux. I simply want
to ask you whether you consider him a proper visitor in this house?"
"I choose it! I am mistress here!"
For a moment an angry reply seemed to quiver upon the woman's lips,
but it died away.
"You are right! I thank you for reminding me of it," she said quietly.
"And yet, Adrea, hear me! You are doing an evil thing! Was your
father's murder so light a thing to you that you can join hands with
his murderer's son? Remember that day! Think of your father lying
across that chamber floor, stricken dead in a single moment by Martin
de Vaux--by his father! It is not seemly that you two should stand
there, hand in hand! It is not seemly for you to be under the same
roof! It is horrible!"
There was a moment's silence. Then Adrea threw open the door, and
pointed to it.
"Go!" she ordered coldly. "You have had your say, and that is my
answer! You were my father's friend; I believe that he loved you! It
was for his sake that I offered you shelter! It was for his sake that
I brought you here! But, remember this: if you wish to stay with me,
let me never hear another word from you on this subject!"
She went out silently. Adrea closed the door, and turned round with
all the hardness fading swiftly out of her features. A moment before
there had been a look of the tigress in her eyes; and Paul, watching
her, had shuddered. It was gone now. She came close up to Paul, and
led him to a chair.
"Was I very undignified?" she said, laughing. "I am afraid I was. I
was very angry!"
He shook his head. "You were not undignified," he said, "but you were
very severe. I think that she will go away."
Adrea's face hardened again. "I do not care! I would hate the dearest
friend I had on earth who tried to come between us. Oh! Paul, Paul!
don't you feel as I do; as though the world were empty, and my mind
swept bare of memories,--as though there were no background to it all,
nothing save you and I, and our love?"
Paul drew her to him. For him, at that moment, there was no past nor
any future. The dreamy _abandon_ of her manner seemed to have raised
an echo within him.
"Listen! What is that?" Adrea exclaimed suddenly.
There was the ring of a horse's hoofs in the avenue, and immediately
afterwards a loud peal at the bell. Paul and Adrea looked at one
another breathlessly. Who could it be?
The outer door was opened and closed, and then quick steps passed
across the hall. The drawing-room door was thrown open, and Arthur
de Vaux, pale and splashed with mud from head to foot, stood upon the
threshold.