THE SILVER FOX 131 



moments; then, while the pine-needle carpet 

 seemed to rise np under his feet, he took 

 her ungloved right hand, and raised it, 

 stick and all, to meet his face as he bent 

 over it, like a man stooping to drink. He 

 kissed it, hurriedly and awkwardly, but in 

 an instant the fine and slender fingers had 

 escaped from his lips, and he stood by her, 

 speechless and dizzy. In that moment of 

 silence his heart opened and let in her 

 dearness like a flood ; before the next could 

 dawn with its possibilities, a woman's voice 

 broke out of the wood, through twilight 

 barred with tree stems. It was so near, it 

 was so whetted with agony, so flung about 

 with gusts of passion, that, for the moment, 

 oblivious of what had just passed, they 

 stared at each other for the space of a long- 

 held breath, and were carried on towards 

 it with that instinct that drags every 

 human being towards sufiering. A smell 

 of wood-smoke drifted lightly in the air : 

 it strengthened as a bend of the path 

 straightened before them, till they saw 



