THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT
The thought of the old spring well came to him. She was leading him there, perhaps; but past the place where the path turned off she went without a look toward it. As the descent grew sharper her dancing steps became a run. Not, it seemed, in apprehension of anything that might pursue, but wild with pleasure, like a child dashing out of an open door. They raced each other, swinging around turns, losing caution on the firm road, ceasing to think of feet, seeming to fly. Little creatures darted across their way. A fox dashing in front of them showed them round eyes of gold and left them laughing.
The fork of the road brought a momentary halt. There was more black here than light. The fancy he had had when he looked at the walls of his room had become real. They were together among a tracery of forest branches. Yet these things were never as they were imagined. She was not. He could not touch her. Her hand slipped from him like light or water.
"Won't they know we have gone?" he asked.
"Well, we will have gone," she answered, and laughed. The inconsequent, reckless note made him uneasy, yet it excited him. She made him feel as though there were no house anywhere, no brains to be flushed, nor hearts to be cold, whatever might become of the two in the hollow of the hills, in the
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