In her innocent and noble soul John Derringham now reigned as king. He
had never had a rival, and never would have while breath stayed in her
fair body.
By the evening of that day he had reasoned himself into believing that
the whole thing was a dream--or, if not a dream, he had better consider
it as such; but at the same time, as the dusk grew, a wild longing
swelled in his heart for its recurrence, and when the night came he
could not any longer control himself, and as he had done before he
wandered to the tree.
The moon, one day beyond its first quarter, was growing brighter, and a
strange and mysterious shimmer was over everything as though the heat of
the day were rising to give welcome and fuse itself in the night.
He was alone with the bird who throbbed from the copse, and as he sat in
the sublime stillness he fancied he saw some does peep forth. They were
there, of course, with their new-born fawns.
But where was she, the nymph of the night?
His heart ached, the longing grew intense until it was a mighty force.
He felt he could stride across the luminous park which separated them,
and scale the wall to the casement window of the long gallery, to clasp
her once more in his arms.
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