XXXVII His Great Hour

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"Because I understand Orlando. He reads men's natures like a book. The man he trusts, we may trust. To-morrow, he will speak openly enough. All cause for reticence will be gone.

"You have confidence then in the success of this undertaking?"

"If I hadn't, I should not be here. I could hardly bear to witness his failure, even in a secret test like this. I should find it too hard to face him afterwards."

"I don't understand."

"Orlando has great pride. If this enterprise fails I cannot answer for him. He would be capable of anything. Why, Doris! what is the matter, child? I never saw you look like that before."

She had been down on her knees regulating the lantern, and the sudden flame, shooting up, had shown him her face turned up towards his in an apprehension which verged on horror.

"Do I look frightened?" she asked, remembering herself and lightly rising. "I believe that I am a little frightened. If - if anything should go wrong! If an accident-" But here she remembered herself again and quickly changed her tone. "But your confidence shall be mine. I will believe in his good angel or - or in his self-command and great resolution. I'll not be frightened any more."

But Oswald did not seem satisfied. He continued to look at her in vague concern.

He hardly knew what to make of the intense feeling she had manifested. Had Orlando touched her girlish heart? Had this cold-blooded nature, with its steel-like brilliancy and honourable but stern views of life, moved this warm and sympathetic soul to more than admiration? The thought disturbed him so he forgot the nearness of the moment they were all awaiting till a quick rasping sound from the hangar, followed by the sudden appearance of an ever-widening band of light about its upper rim, drew his attention and awakened them all to a breathless expectation.

The lid was rising. Now it was half-way up, and now, for the first time, it was lifted to its full height and stood a broad oval disc against the background of the forest. The effect was strange. The hangar had been made brilliant by many lamps, and their united glare pouring from its top and illuminating not only the surrounding treetops but the broad face of this uplifted disc, roused in the awed spectator a thrill such as in mythological times might have greeted the sudden sight of Vulcan's smithy blazing on Olympian hills. But the clang of iron on iron would have attended the flash and gleam of those unexpected fires, and here all was still save for that steady throb never heard in Olympus or the halls of Valhalla, the pant of the motor eager for flight in the upper air.

As they listened in a trance of burning hope which obliterated all else, this noise and all others near and distant, was suddenly lost in a loud clatter of writhing and twisting boughs which set the forest in a roar and seemed to heave the air about them.