Gertrude's right hand,
Sallust's House, with its cinnamon-colored walls and yellow frieze, gave
a foreign air to the otherwise very English landscape. She passed by
without remembering who lived there. Further down, on some waste land
separated from the road by a dry ditch and a low mud wall, a cluster of
hemlocks, nearly six feet high, poisoned the air with their odor. She
crossed the ditch, took a pair of gardening gloves from her plaited
straw hand-basket, and busied herself with the hemlock leaves, pulling
the tender ones, separating them from the stalk, and filling the basket
with the web. She forgot Max until an impression of dead silence, as
if the earth had stopped, caused her to look round in vague dread.
Trefusis, with his hand abandoned to the dog, who was trying how much of
it he could cram into his mouth, was standing within a few yards of her,
watching her intently. Gertrude turned pale, and came out hastily from
among the bushes. Then she had a strange sensation as if something
had happened high above her head. There was a threatening growl, a
commanding exclamation, and an unaccountable pause, at the expiration
of which she found herself supine on the sward, with her parasol between
her eyes and the sun. A sudden scoop of Max's wet warm tongue in her
right ear startled her into activity. She sat up, and saw Trefusis
on his knees at her side holding the parasol with an unconcerned
expression, whilst Max was snuffing at her in restless anxiety opposite.

"I must go home," she said. "I must go home instantly."

"Not at all," said Trefusis, soothingly. "They have just sent word to
say that everything is settled satisfactorily and that you need not
come."

"Have they?" she said faintly. Then she lay down again, and it seemed to
her that a very long time elapsed. Suddenly recollecting that Trefusis
had supported her gently with his hand to prevent her falling back too
rudely, she rose again, and this time got upon her feet with his help.

"I must go home," she said again. "It is a matter of life or death."

"No, no," he said softly. "It is all right. You may depend on me."

She looked at him earnestly. He had taken her hand to steady her, for
she was swaying a little. "Are you sure," she said, grasping his arm.
"Are you quite sure?"

"Absolutely certain. You know I am always right, do you not?"

"Yes, oh, yes; you have always been true to me. You--" Here her senses
came back with a rush. Dropping his