If you’re not, I tell you I shall have my banns up, and
you may get back too late.”

“What do you mean, Eric? You are mad!”

“No more mad than you are, Abel Behenna. You go, that’s your chance! I
stay, that’s mine! I don’t mean to let the grass grow under my feet. Sarah cared no more for you than for me five minutes ago, and she may
come back to that five minutes after you’re gone! You won by a point
only—the game may change.”

“The game won’t change!” said Abel shortly. “Sarah, you’ll be true to
me? You won’t marry till I return?”

“For a year!” added Eric, quickly, “that’s the bargain.”

“I promise for the year,” said Sarah. A dark look came over Abel’s
face, and he was about to speak, but he mastered himself and smiled. “I mustn’t be too hard or get angry tonight! Come, Eric! we played and
fought together. I won fairly. I played fairly all the game of our
wooing! You know that as well as I do; and now when I am going away, I
shall look to my old and true comrade to help me when I am gone!”

“I’ll help you none,” said Eric, “so help me God!”

“It was God helped me,” said Abel simply. “Then let Him go on helping you,” said Eric angrily. “The Devil is good
enough for me!” and without another word he rushed down the steep path
and disappeared behind the rocks. When he had gone Abel hoped for some tender passage with Sarah, but the
first remark she made chilled him. “How lonely it all seems without Eric!” and this note sounded till he
had left her at home—and after. Early on the next morning Abel heard a noise at his door, and on going
out saw Eric walking rapidly away: a small canvas bag full of gold and
silver lay on the threshold; on a small slip of paper pinned to it was
written:

“Take the money and go. I stay. God for you! The Devil for me! Remember
the 11th of April.—ERIC SANSON.” That afternoon Abel went off to
Bristol, and a week later sailed on the _Star of the Sea_ bound for
Pahang. His money—including that which had been Eric’s—was on board in
the shape of a venture of cheap toys. He had been advised by a shrewd
old mariner of Bristol whom he knew, and who knew the ways of the
Chersonese, who predicted that every penny invested would be returned
with a shilling to boot. As the year wore on Sarah became more and more disturbed in her mind. Eric was always at hand to make love to her in his own persistent,
masterful manner, and to this she did not object. Only one letter came
from Abel, to say that his venture had proved successful, and that he
had sent some two hundred pounds to the bank at Bristol, and was
trading with fifty pounds still remaining in goods for China, whither
the _Star of the Sea_ was bound and whence she would return to Bristol. He suggested that Eric’s share of the venture should be returned to him
with his share of the profits. This proposition was treated with anger
by Eric, and as simply childish by Sarah’s mother. More than six months had since then elapsed, but no other letter had
come, and Eric’s hopes which had been dashed down by the letter from
Pahang, began to rise again. He perpetually assailed Sarah with an
“if!” If Abel did not return, would she then marry him? If the 11th
April went by without Abel being in the port, would she give him over? If Abel had taken his fortune, and married another girl on the head of
it, would she marry him, Eric, as soon as the truth were known? And so
on in an endless variety of possibilities. The power of the strong will
and the determined purpose over the woman’s weaker nature became in
time manifest. Sarah began to lose her faith in Abel and to regard Eric
as a possible husband; and a possible husband is in a woman’s eye
different to all other men. A new affection for him began to arise in
her breast, and the daily familiarities of permitted courtship
furthered the growing affection. Sarah began to regard Abel as rather a
rock in the road of her life, and had it not been for her mother’s
constantly reminding her of the good fortune already laid by in the
Bristol Bank she would have tried to have shut her eyes altogether to
the fact of Abel’s existence. The 11th April was Saturday, so that in order to have the marriage on
that day it would be necessary that the banns should be called on
Sunday, 22nd March. From the beginning of that month Eric kept
perpetually on the subject of Abel’s absence, and his outspoken opinion
that the latter was either dead or married began to become a reality to
the woman’s mind. As the first half of the month wore on Eric became
more jubilant, and after church on the 15th he took Sarah for a walk to
the Flagstaff Rock. There he asserted himself strongly:

“I told Abel, and you too, that if he was not here to put up his banns
in time for the eleventh, I would put up mine for the twelfth. Now the
time has come when I mean to do it. He hasn’t kept his word”—here Sarah
struck in out of her weakness and indecision:

“He hasn’t broken it yet!” Eric ground his teeth with anger. “If you mean to stick up for him,” he said, as he smote his hands
savagely on the flagstaff, which sent forth a shivering murmur, “well
and good. I’ll keep my part of the bargain. On Sunday I shall give
notice of the banns, and you can deny them in the church if you will. If Abel is in Pencastle on the eleventh, he can have them cancelled,
and his own put up; but till then, I take my course, and woe to anyone
who stands in my way!” With that he flung himself down the rocky
pathway, and Sarah could not but admire his Viking strength and spirit,
as, crossing the hill, he strode away along the cliffs towards Bude. During the week no news was heard of Abel, and on Saturday Eric gave
notice of the banns of marriage between himself and Sarah Trefusis. The
clergyman would have remonstrated with him, for although nothing formal
had been told to the neighbours, it had been understood since Abel’s
departure that on his return he was to marry Sarah; but Eric would not
discuss the question. “It is a painful subject, sir,” he said with a firmness which the
parson, who was a very young man, could not but be swayed by. “Surely
there is nothing against Sarah or me. Why should there be any bones
made about the matter?” The parson said no more, and on the next day he
read out the banns for the first time amidst an audible buzz from the
congregation. Sarah was present, contrary to custom, and though she
blushed furiously enjoyed her triumph over the other girls whose banns
had not yet come. Before the week was over she began to make her
wedding dress. Eric used to come and look at her at work and the sight
thrilled through him. He used to say all sorts of pretty things to her
at such times, and there were to both delicious moments of love-making. The banns were read a second time on the 29th, and Eric’s hope grew
more and more fixed though there were to him moments of acute despair
when he realised that the cup of happiness might be dashed from his
lips at any moment, right up to the last.