But passing the
cactus hedge her dress caught. It was as if the hedge sentiently took
hold of her.
She bent down to free the thin white material; and suddenly colour blazed
up to her eyes in the rain of silver moonlight. The buds had opened since
she noticed them last.
No longer was the hedge a grim barricade of stiff, dark sticks. Each
stalk had turned into a tall, straight flame of lambent rose. From a dead
thing of dreary ugliness it had become a thing of living beauty.
Knight's allegory!
He had said, perhaps she might understand when the time came; and perhaps
not.
She _did_ understand. But she had not faith to believe that the miracle
could repeat itself in life--her life and Knight's. She shut her eyes to
the thought, and when she had freed her dress ran very fast to the house.
CHAPTER XXVI
THE THREE WORDS
Knight was generally far away long before Annesley was up in the morning,
and often he did not come in till evening. She thought that on Easter
Day, however, he would perhaps not go far. She half expected that he
would linger about the house or sit reading on the veranda; and she could
not resist the temptation to put on one of the dresses he had liked in
England.
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