a good deal spoilt by her town life; but he hated towns, and it was a proof of her worth in his eyes that she was not hopelessly spoilt. He saw hope for her still – if she would marry him. He was a modest man in general, but he did feel this most strongly. She was going to England without caring whether she went or not; she would do much better by marrying him and coming back to her old home in the bush. That home she loved, whether she loved him or not; in it she had grown up simple and credulous and sweet, with a wicked side that only picked out her sweetness; in it he believed that her life and his might yet be beautiful. The feeling made him sometimes rejoice that she had fallen a little out of love with her life, so that he might show her with all the effect of contrast what life and love really were; it thrilled his heart with generous throbs, it brought the moisture to his honest eyes, and it came to him oftener and with growing force as the days went on, by reason of certain signs they brought forth in Christiana. Her voice lost its bitterness in his ears, not because he had grown used to notes that had jarred him in the beginning, but because the discordant strings came gradually into tune. Her freshness came back to her with the charm and influence of the wilderness she loved; her old self lived again to Jack Swift. On the other hand, she came to realize her own delight in the old good life as she had never realized it before; she felt that henceforward she should miss it as she had not missed it yet. Now she could have defined her sensations and given reasons for them. She spent many hours in the saddle, on a former mount of hers that Swift had run up for her; often he rode with her, and the scent of the pines, the swelling of the sand-hills against the sky, the sense of Nothing between the horses' ears and the sunset, spoke to her spirit as they had never done of old. And even so on their rides would she speak to Swift, who listened grimly, hardly daring to answer her for the fear of saying at the wrong moment what he had resolved to say once and for all before she went.
And he chose the wrong moment after all. It was the eve of her going, and they were riding together for the last time; he felt that it was also his last opportunity. So in six miles he made as many remarks, then turned in his saddle and spoke out with overpowering fervor. This may be expected of the self-contained suitor, with whom it is only a question of time, and the longer the time the stronger the outburst. But Christina was not carried away, for she did not quite love him, and the opportunity was a bad one, and Swift's honest method had not improved it. She listened kindly, with her eyes on the distant timbers of the eight-mile whim; but her kindness was fatally calm; and when he waited she refused him firmly. She confessed to a fondness for him. She ascribed this to the years they had known each other. Once and for all she did not love him.
"Not now!" exclaimed the young fellow eagerly. "But you did once! You will again!"
"I never loved you," said the girl gravely. "If you're thinking of two years ago, that was mere nonsense. I don't believe its love with you either, if you only knew it."
"But I do know what it is with me, Tiny! I loved you before you went away, and all the time you were gone. Since you have been back, during these few days, I have got to love you more than ever. And so I shall go on, whatever happens. I can't help it, darling."
Neither could he help saying this; for the hour found him unable to accept his fate quite as he had meant to accept it. Her kindness had something to do with that. And now she spoke more kindly than before.
"Are you sure?" she said.
"Am I sure!" he echoed bitterly.
"It is so easy to deceive oneself."
"I am not deceived."
"It is so easy to imagine yourself – "
"I am not imagining!" cried Swift impatiently. "I am the man who has loved you always, and never any girl but you. If you can't believe that, you must have had a very poor experience of men, Tiny!"
For a moment she looked away from the whim which they were slowly nearing, and her eyes met his.
"I have," she admitted frankly; "I have had a particularly poor experience of them. Yet I am sorry to find you so different from the rest; I can't tell you how sorry I am to find you true to me."
"Sorry?" he said tenderly; for her voice was full of pain, and he could not bear that. "Why should you be sorry, dear?"
"Why – because I never dreamt of being true to you."
For some reason her face flamed as he watched it. There was a pause. Then he said:
"You are not engaged; are you in love?"
"Very far from it."
"Then why mind? If there is no one else you care for you shall care for me yet. I'll make you. I'll wait for you. You don't know me! I won't give you up until you are some other fellow's wife."
His stern eyes, the way his mouth shut on the words, and the manly determination of the words themselves gave the girl a thrill of pleasure and of pride; but also a pang; for at that moment she felt the wish to love him alongside the inability, and all at once she was as sorry for herself as for him.
"What should you mind?" repeated Swift.
"I can't tell you, but you can guess what I have been."
"A flirt?" He laughed aloud. "Darling, I don't care two figs for your flirtations! I wanted you to enjoy yourself. What does it matter how you've enjoyed yourself, so long as you haven't absolutely been getting engaged or falling in love?"
Her chin drooped into her loose white blouse. "I did fall in love," she said slowly – "at any rate I thought so; and I very nearly got engaged."
Swift had never seen so much color in her face.
Presently he said, "What happened?" but immediately added, "I beg your pardon; of course I have no business to ask." His tone was more stiff than strained.
"You have business," she answered eagerly, fearful of making him less than friend. "I wouldn't mind telling you the whole thing, except the man's name. And yet," she added rather wistfully, "I suppose you're the only friend I have that doesn't know! It's hard lines to have to tell you."
"Then I don't want to know anything at all about it," exclaimed Swift impulsively. "I would rather you didn't tell me a word, if you don't mind. I am only too thankful to think you got out of it, whatever it was."
"I didn't get out of it."
"You don't – mean – that the man did?"
Swift was aghast.
"I do."
He did not speak, but she heard him breathing. Stealing a look at him, her eyes fell first upon the clenched fist lying on his knee.
She made haste to defend the man.
"It wasn't all his fault; of that I feel sure. If you knew who he was you wouldn't blame him anymore than I do. He was quite a boy, too; I don't suppose he was a free agent. In any case it is all quite, quite over."
"Is it? He was from England – that's why you hate the home people so!"
"Yes, he was from home. He went back very suddenly. It wasn't his fault. He was sent for. But he might have said good-by!"
She spoke reflectively, gazing once more at the whim. They were near it now. The framework cut the sky like some uncouth hieroglyph. To Swift henceforward, on all his lonely journeys hither, it was the emblem of humiliation. But it was not his own humiliation that moistened his clenched hand now.
"I wish I had him here," he muttered.
"Ah! you know nothing about him, you see; I know enough to forgive him. And I have got over it, quite; but the worst of it is that I can't believe any more in any of you – I simply can't."
"Not in me?" asked Swift warmly, for her belief in him, at least, he knew he deserved. "I have always been the same. I have never thought of any other girl but you, and I never will. I love you, darling!"
"After this, Jack?"
He seemed to disappoint her.
"After the same thing if it happens all over again in England! There is no merit in it; I simply can't help myself. While you are away I will wait for you and work for you; only come back free, and I will win you, too, in the end. You are happier here than anywhere else,