All the distance from Bellaire to Mottville Theodore was tortured with doubt. He brought to mind Jinnie's girlish embarrassment when they had been together; the fluttering white lids as his kisses brought a blue flash from the speaking love-lit eyes. She had loved him then; did she now? Of course she must love him! She had brought to him the freshness of spring--the love of the mating birds among the blossoms--the passionate desire of a heaven-wrought soul for its own, to whom could be entrusted all that was his dearest and best. He would follow her and win her,--yea, win the woman God had made for him and him alone, and into his eyes leapt the expression of the conquering male, the force God had created within him to reach for the woman sublime and cherish her.
When the car entered Mottville, rain was falling and the wind was mourning ceaselessly.
By inquiry, Theodore found the road to the Singleton farm, and again, as he impatiently sank back in the motor, he mentally vowed, with the vow of a strong man, that the girl should listen to him. He never realized, until they were climbing the rain-soaked hill, how starved was the very soul of him.
The road was running with water, but they ploughed on, until through the trees the farmhouse loomed up darkly. Bennett stopped the car at the gate and Theodore jumped out. A light twinkling in the upper part of the house told him she was there. Harmonious echoes were sounding and resounding in his ears. They were notes from Jinnie's fiddle, and for a moment, as they sobbed out through the attic window, he leaned back against the wet fence, feeling almost faint. The wild, sweet, unearthly melody surged over him with memories of the past.
Then he passed under the thrashing pines, mounted the broken steps, and entered the house.
It took but a minute to find the stairs by which to reach her, and there he stood in the gloom of the attic door, watching the swaying young figure and noting the whole pitiful dejection of her. In the single little light her eyes were as blue as the wing of a royal bird, and oh, what suffering she must have gone through! Then Jinnie ceased playing, and, as if drawn by a presence she knew not of, she turned her eyes slowly toward the door, and when she saw him, she fell, huddled with her violin on the garret floor, staring upward with frightened eyes.
"If you're there," she panted, "if--if--speak to me!"
He bounded forward and gathered her up, and the light of an adoring love shone full upon him.