Ethne, however, still kept him at her side.
Though she sat so calmly and still, though her face was quiet in its
look of gravity, her heart ached with longing. Just for a little longer,
she pleaded to herself. The sunlight was withdrawing from the walls of
the church. She measured out a space upon the walls where it still
glowed bright. When all that space was cold grey stone, she would send
Harry Feversham away.
"I am glad that you escaped from Omdurman without the help of Lieutenant
Sutch or Colonel Durrance. I wanted so much that everything should be
done by you alone without anybody's help or interference," she said, and
after she had spoken there followed a silence. Once or twice she looked
towards the wall, and each time she saw the space of golden light
narrowed, and knew that her minutes were running out. "You suffered
horribly at Dongola," she said in a low voice. "Colonel Trench told me."
"What does it matter now?" Feversham answered. "That time seems rather
far away to me."
"Had you anything of mine with you?"
"I had your white feather."
"But anything else? Any little thing which I had given you in the other
days?"
"Nothing."
"I had your photograph," she said.
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