She looked upward
to the starlit sky. "It will be fine, I hope. Oh, it _must_ be fine.
To-morrow is my one day. I do so want it to be perfect," she exclaimed.
"I don't think you need fear."
She held out her hand to him.
"This is good-by, I suppose," she said, and she did not hide the regret
the words brought to her.
Chayne took her hand and kept it for a second or two. He ought to start
an hour and a half before her. That he knew very well. But he answered:
"No. We go the same road for a little while. When do you start?"
"At half past one."
"I too. It will be daybreak before we say good-by. I wonder whether you
will sleep at all to-night. I never do the first night."
He spoke lightly, and she answered him in the same key.
"I shall hardly know whether I sleep or wake, with the noise of that
stream rising through my window. For so far back as I can remember I
always dream of running water."
The words laid hold upon Chayne's imagination and fixed her in his
memories. He knew nothing of her really, except just this one curious
fact. She dreamed of running water. Somehow it was fitting that she
should. There was a kind of resemblance; running water was, in a way,
an image of her. She seemed in her nature to be as clear and fresh; yet
she was as elusive; and when she laughed, her laugh had a music as
light and free.
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