being.

The idea was too dim for her to see it face to face. Its mere
possibility dissolved the instant she focused it to get the truth behind
it. It was too utterly elusive, made, protaean. Under the attack of even
a minute's concentration the very meaning of it vanished, melted away.
The idea lay really behind any words that she could ever find, beyond
the touch of definite thought.

Her mind was unable to grapple with it. But, while it vanished, the
trail of its approach and disappearance flickered a moment before her
shaking vision. The horror certainly remained.

Reduced to the simple human statement that her temperament sought
instinctively, it stood perhaps at this: Her husband loved her, and he
loved the trees as well; but the trees came first, claimed parts of him
she did not know. _She_ loved her God and him. _He_ loved the trees
and her.

Thus, in guise of some faint, distressing compromise, the matter shaped
itself for her perplexed mind in the terms of conflict. A silent, hidden
battle raged, but as yet raged far away. The breaking of the cedar was a
visible outward fragment of a distant and mysterious encounter that was
coming daily closer to them both. The wind, instead of roaring in the
Forest further out, now cam nearer, booming in fitful gusts about its
edge and frontiers.

Meanwhile the summer dimmed. The autumn winds went sighing through the
woods, leaves turned to golden red, and the evenings were drawing in
with cozy shadows before the first sign of anything seriously untoward
made its appearance. It came then with a flat, decided kind of violence
that indicated mature preparation beforehand. It was not impulsive nor
ill-considered. In a fashion it seemed expected, and indeed inevitable.
For within a fortnight of their annual change to the little village of
Seillans above St. Raphael--a change so regular for the past ten years
that it was not even discussed between them--David Bittacy abruptly
refused to go.

Thompson had laid the tea-table, prepared the spirit lamp beneath the
urn, pulled down the blinds in that swift and silent way she had, and
left the room. The lamps were still unlit. The fire-light shone on the
chintz armchairs, and Boxer lay asleep on the black horse-hair rug. Upon
the walls the gilt picture frames gleamed faintly, the pictures
themselves indistinguishable. Mrs. Bittacy had warmed the teapot and was
in the act of pouring the water in to heat the cups when her husband,