“Oh—talk!” said Joan. “There’s always such a weary deal of talk.” She had regained her calm; at least she was no longer afraid of the physician. But for all that—and for all her comparative happiness this beautiful day and for her singing—she looked older and less care-free than she had done last year. Her face was thinner, and there appeared in her, now and again, a startled, listening air. It came now. “Do you hear a horse coming?” At no part in the forest were you far from some cart track along which might, indeed, push a horseman. One was here now, leaving the track and coming between the tree boles. Presumably he had heard voices. Joan rose to her feet. Her eyes were glittering. “No peace—” she said. “He leaves me no peace at all. I wish he were dead.” She spoke in a very low voice, hardly above a whisper, measured, but tinctured with both anger and dread. It was Harry Carthew, Aderhold now saw, who approached. He caught sight of them, checked the roan a perceptible moment, then came on. The great horse stopped within ten feet of the two beneath the beech tree. Carthew sat looking at them, a strange expression upon his face. Aderhold had no knowledge of the why or wherefore of his look, though Joan’s ejaculation might be making for illumination. But his mind was preoccupied with those pale fears which her earlier speech had awakened. He was thinking only of these—or rather he was not consciously thinking at all; he was only gathering his forces forward after the recoil. He answered Carthew’s look with a somewhat blank gaze. “Good-day,” he said. “Give you good-day,” answered Carthew. “How long have you and Joan Heron been trysting?” Aderhold’s thoughts were still away. He repeated the word after the other, but put no meaning to it. “‘Trysting’—” It was Joan who took it up, with a flame of anger. “Who is trysting, Master Carthew?—Not one of these three—not he with me, nor I with him, nor I with you! God’s mercy! Cannot a girl speak a civil word to a chance-met neighbour—” “‘Neighbour,’” said Carthew. “That is true. I had not thought of that. The Grange and Heron’s cottage are not so far apart—might be said to be neighbours.—’Neighbours’—it is easy for neighbours to meet—with this dark wood touching each house.” He lifted his hand to his throat, then turned upon Aderhold with a brow so black, a gesture so violent that the other instinctively gave back a pace. “I have been blind!” cried Carthew thickly. “I have been blind!” Aderhold, amazed, spoke with an awakening and answering anger. “I do not know what you mean, Master Carthew,—or, if I guess, seeing that your words will bear that interpretation,—I will tell you that your bolt goes wide!—Mistress Joan Heron and I chanced to meet five minutes before you appeared before us—and I do think in my soul that it is the second time we have spoken together in our lives! And I know not your right—”