He heard her footstep, and when she would have turned to avoid him, he prevented it by facing about and greeting her. Both were conscious of constraint. Jacob Eaton’s bullet had not broken the bone of his arm, but the arm was still bandaged under the sleeve and stiff, and the fact of the duel seemed to materialize between them. The other thought, the thought of Jean Bartlett and her child, sprang up unbidden in her heart, and she was woman enough to wince. A torrent of feeling swept through her like a whirlpool, and she would not have told what it was, or whence it came. Her face crimsoned, and unconsciously she drew back. Something in his face, in the compelling light in his eyes, made her catch her breath. On his side, he saw only reluctance and repulsion, and mistook it for rebuke. He remembered that report said she was to marry Jacob Eaton, and he had knocked Jacob Eaton down. He would have been less than human had he not experienced then one instant of unholy joy to think that he had done it. Neither spoke for a full moment, then he did ceremoniously. “Pardon me,” he said, “I ought not to intrude upon you, Miss Royall. I see that I am doubly unfortunate, both unexpected and unwelcome.” Diana struggled with herself. “Unexpected, certainly,” she said, conscious that it was a falsehood, for had he not haunted her? “but unwelcome--why? This is a public place, Mr. Trench.” He smiled bitterly. “Fairly answered,” he said; “you can be cruel, Miss Royall. I am aware that to you--I merely cumber the earth.” “I believe you refused an invitation to come to our house,” she retorted. He swung around in the path, facing her fully, and she felt his determination, with almost a thrill of pride in him. “Miss Royall--I have no right to say a word,” he said, “but do you think--for one instant--that if you gave that invitation sincerely I would refuse it? You know I would not. I would come with all my heart. But--because I know how absurd it is, because I know how you feel, I will not. I am too proud to be your unwelcome guest. Yet I am not too proud to speak to-night. God knows I wish I could kill it in my heart, but I will say it. I love you.” Diana stretched her hand out involuntarily and rested it against the slender stem of a young pine; she clung to it to feel reality, for the world seemed to be turning around. She never opened her lips and she dared not look at him; she had met that light in his eyes once and dared not raise hers. If she had! But she did not--and he went on. “It is madness, I know it,” he said bitterly, “and if I could strangle it--as a living thing--I would, but I cannot. I love you and have loved you from the first. It would be mockery indeed to accept your chary invitations. I suppose you think that it is an insult for me to speak to you, but”--he smiled bitterly--“to myself I should seem a little less than a man if I did not. However, I beg your pardon, if it seems an affront.”