He had become such a part of herself
that she could not all at once divest herself of that waiting
feeling, that confident looking forward to a future with him. And
yet, strangely, her memory of him had receded into distance, become
dim and remote. In Burke's presence she could not recall him at
all. The two personalities, dissimilar though she knew them to be,
seemed in some curious fashion to have become merged into one. She
could not understand her own feelings, but she was conscious of
relief that the die was cast. Whatever lay before her, she was
sure of one thing. Burke Ranger would be her safeguard against any
evil that might arise and menace her. His protection was of the
solid quality that would never fail her. She felt firm ground
beneath her feet at last.
At the sound of his returning step, she turned with the moonlight
on her face and smiled up at him with complete confidence.
CHAPTER XII
THE STALE
Whenever in after days Sylvia looked back upon her marriage, it
seemed to be wrapped in a species of hazy dream like the early
mists on that far-off range of hills.
They did not go again to Ritzen, but to a town of greater
importance further down the line, a ride of nearly forty miles
across the _veldt_. It was a busy town in the neighbourhood of
some mines, and its teeming life brought back again to her that
sense of aloneness in a land of strangers that had so oppressed her
in the beginning.
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