In some cryptic way it was associated with the direful
experience through which she had just passed.
What she heard in the darkness was a voice which sang there by her
window--at it or beneath it--the words of a Romany song.
It was a song of violence, which she had heard but a short time before in
the trees behind her father's house, when a Romany claimed her as his
wife:
"Time was I went to my true love,
Time was she came to me--"
Only one man would sing that song at her window, or anywhere in this
Western world. This was no illusion of her overwrought senses. There,
outside her window, was Jethro Fawe.
She sat up and listened, leaning on one arm, and staring into the
half-darkness beyond the window, the blind of which she had not drawn
down. There was no moon, but the stars were shining brightly, relieving
the intensity of the dark. Through the whispering of the trees, and
hushing the melancholy of a night-bird's song, came the wild low note of
the Romany epic of vengeance. It had a thrill of exultation. Something in
the voice, insistent, vibrating, personal, made every note a thrust of
victory. In spite of her indignation at the insolent serenade, she
thrilled; for the strain of the Past was in her, and it had been fighting
with her all night, breaking in upon the Present, tugging at the cords of
youth.
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