Not far away a jackal laughed. After a pause
it was answered by another jackal at a distance. The voices of these
desert beasts brought home to Domini with an intimacy not felt by her
before the exquisite remoteness of their situation, and the shrill,
discordant noise, rising and falling with a sort of melancholy and
sneering mirth, mingled with bitterness, was like a delicate music in
her ears.
"Hark!" Androvsky whispered.
The first jackal laughed once more, was answered again. A third beast,
evidently much farther off, lifted up a faint voice like a dismal echo.
Then there was silence.
"You loved that, Domini. It was like the calling of freedom to you--and
to me. We've found freedom; we've found it. Let us feel it. Let us take
hold of it. It is the only thing, the only thing. But you can't know
that as I do, Domini."
Again she was conscious that his intensity surpassed hers, and the
consciousness, instead of saddening or vexing, made her thrill with joy.
"I am maddened by this freedom," he said; "maddened by it, Domini. I
can't help--I can't--"
He laid his lips upon hers in a desperate caress that almost suffocated
her.
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