came floating up; they were parted
now by darkness; the moon of flowers was gone, in its place had been set
handfuls of purple or crimson blossoms. And a puff of warm air rising
quickly out of the night drifted their scent of cloves into his face, so
that he held his breath for fear of calling out her name.

Again the hands had vanished--through the open window there was nothing
to be seen but darkness; and such a rush of longing seized on Miltoun
as stole from him all power of movement. He could hear her playing, now.
The murmurous current of that melody was like the night itself, sighing,
throbbing, languorously soft. It seemed that in this music she was
calling him, telling him that she, too, was longing; her heart, too,
empty. It died away; and at the window her white figure appeared. From
that vision he could not, nor did he try to shrink, but moved out into
the lamplight. And he saw her suddenly stretch out her hands to him,
and withdraw them to her breast. Then all save the madness of his
longing deserted Miltoun. He ran down the little garden, across the
hall, up the stairs.

The door was open. He passed through. There, in the sitting-room, where
the red flowers in the window scented all the air, it was dark, and he
could not at first see her, till against the piano he caught the glimmer
of her white dress. She was sitting with hands resting on the pale
notes. And falling on his knees, he buried his face against her. Then,
without looking up, he raised his hands. Her tears fell on them
covering her heart, that throbbed as if the passionate night itself were
breathing in there, and all but the night and her love had stolen forth.

CHAPTER XIV

On a spur of the Sussex Downs, inland from Nettle-Cold, there stands a
beech-grove. The traveller who enters it out of the heat and brightness,
takes off the shoes of his spirit before its, sanctity; and, reaching
the centre, across the clean beech-mat, he sits refreshing his brow with
air, and silence. For the flowers of sunlight on the ground under those
branches are pale and rare, no insects hum, the birds are almost mute.
And close to the border trees are the quiet, milk-white sheep, in
congregation, escaping from noon heat. Here, above fields and dwellings,
above the ceaseless network of men's doings, and the vapour of their
talk, the traveller feels solemnity. All seems conveying divinity--the
great white clouds moving their wings above him, the faint longing