There were no roses now, she was very pale as she said: "It saddens me,
this. Let us go out into the sun."
They descended the staircase again almost in silence, and on through the
little door in the court-yard wall into the beautiful garden beyond.
"Show me where she was happy, where you know she was happy before any
troubles came. I want to be gay again," said Theodora.
So they walked down the path towards the hameau.
"What have I done?" Lord Bracondale wondered. "Her adorable face went
quite white. Her soul is no longer the open book I have found it. There
are depths and depths, but I must fathom them all."
"Oh, how I love the spring-time!" exclaimed Theodora, and her voice was
full of relief. "Look at those greens, so tender and young, and that
peep of the sky! Oh, and those dear, pretty little dolls' houses! Let us
hasten; I want to go and play there, and make butter, too! Don't you?"
"Ah, this is good," he said; "and I want just what you want."
Her face was all sweet and joyous as she turned it to him.
"Let's pretend we lived then," she said, "and I am the miller's daughter
of this dear little mill, and you are the bailiff's son who lives
opposite, and you have come with your corn to be ground. Oh, and I shall
make a bargain, and charge you dear!" and she laughed and swung her
parasol back, while the sun glorified her hair into burnished silver.
"What bargain could you make that I would not agree to willingly?" he
asked.
"Perhaps some day I shall make one with you--or want to--that you will
not like," she said, "and then I shall remind you of this day and your
gallant speech."
"And I shall say then as I say now. I will make any bargain with you,
so long as it is a bargain which benefits us both."
"Ah, you are a Normand, you hedge!" she laughed, but he was serious.
They walked all around the laiterie, and all the time she was gay and
whimsical, and to herself she was saying, "I am unutterably happy, but
we must not talk of love."
"Now you have had enough of this," Lord Bracondale said, when they were
again in view of the house, "and I am going to take you into a forest
like the babes in the woods, and we shall go and lose ourselves and
forget the world altogether. The very sight of these harmless tourists
in the distance jars upon me to-day. I want you alone and no one else.
Come."