To the rest she was stamped forever as a lying gossip,
forgiven by the very man she had striven to harm. I shuddered; and Jim,
feeling it, turned to me and drew me towards Lisbeth. Outside of the
scattering crowd she saw us and greeted me gravely; then gave her hand
to Jim with a little quickening gesture of trust.
We went down the road together, taking the longest way to the foot of
the hill, Jim loquacious, eager; Lisbeth silent. The rain had melted
into a soft mist, and through it her face took on a greater remoteness,
a pallid, elfin quality. At the foot of the hill, which had to be
climbed again to reach the old farmhouse, she stopped, glancing up to
the plank where the turkeys were already roosting.
"Not going up the hill, Lisbeth?" I asked.
She shook her head.
"We live here now," she said.
"Not--?"
"All the year round.--It's cheaper," she added with that little touch of
staunchness that had become hers.
"But it's too--"
I was cut short by the look of anguish in her eyes, the most poignant
sign of emotion that I had seen her show since my return. There was an
awkward silence, while I stood looking at her, thinking of nothing so
much as how her head would look against a worn, gold Florentine
background, instead of silhouetted against these flat unchanging
stretches of unbending roads and red barns.
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