Part 17 (1/2)

She fancied it was Peter returned to mark her progress, and stretched her hand to the coffee-urn. But ere she touched it she knew that she was mistaken. She turned and saw Monck.

By the grey light of the morning his face startled her. She had never seen it look so haggard. But out of it the dark eyes shone, alert and indomitable, albeit she suspected that they had not slept for many hours.

He made her a brief bow. ”May I join you?” he said.

His manner was formal, but she could not stand on her dignity with him at that moment. Impulsively, almost involuntarily it seemed to her later, she rose, offering him both her hands. ”Captain Monck,” she said, ”you are--splendid!”

Words and action were alike wholly spontaneous. They were also wholly unexpected. She saw a strange look flash across his face. Just for a second he hesitated. Then he took her hands and held them fast.

”Ah--Stella!” he said.

With the name his eyes kindled. His weariness vanished as darkness vanishes before the glare of electricity. He drew her suddenly and swiftly to him.

For a few throbbing seconds Stella was so utterly amazed that she made no resistance. He astounded her at every turn, this man. And yet in some strange and vital fas.h.i.+on her moods responded to his. He was not beyond comprehension or even sympathy. But as she found his dark face close to hers and felt his eyes scorch her like a flame, expediency rather than dismay urged her to action. There was something so sublimely natural about him at that moment that she could not feel afraid.

She drew back from him gasping. ”Oh please--please!” she said. ”Captain Monck, let me go!”

He held her still, though he drew her no closer. ”Must I?” he said. And in a lower voice, ”Have you forgotten how once in this very room you told me--that I had come to you--too late? And--now!”

The last words seemed to vibrate through and through her. She quivered from head to foot. She could not meet the pa.s.sion in his eyes, but desperately she strove to cope with it ere it mounted beyond her control.

”Ah no, I haven't forgotten,” she said. ”But I was a good deal younger then. I didn't know much of life. I have changed--I have changed enormously.”

”You have changed--in that respect?” he asked her, and she heard in his voice that note of stubbornness which she had heard on that night that seemed so long ago--the night before her marriage.

She freed one hand from his hold and set it pleadingly against his breast. ”That is a difficult question to answer,” she said. ”But do you think a slave would willingly go back into servitude when once he has felt the joy of freedom?”

”Is that what marriage means to you?” he said.

She bent her head. ”Yes.”

But still he did not let her go. ”Stella,” he said, ”I haven't changed since that night.”

She trembled again, but she spoke no word, nor did she raise her eyes.

He went on slowly, quietly, almost on a note of fatalism. ”It is beyond the bounds of possibility that I should change. I loved you then, I love you now. I shall go on loving you as long as I live. I never thought it possible that you could care for me--until you told me so. But I shall not ask you to marry me so long as the thought of marriage means slavery to you. All I ask is that you will not hold yourself back from loving me--that you will not be afraid to be true to your own heart. Is that too much?”

His voice was steady again. She raised her eyes and met his look. The pa.s.sion had gone out of it, but the dominance remained. She thrilled again to the mastery that had held Tommy back from death.

For a moment she could not speak. Then, as he waited, she gathered her strength to answer. ”I mean to be true,” she said rather breathlessly.

”But I--I value my freedom too much ever to marry again. Please, I want you to understand that. You mustn't think of me in that way. You mustn't encourage hopes that can never be fulfilled.”

A faint gleam crossed his face. ”That is my affair,” he said.

”Oh, but I mean it.” Quickly she broke in upon him. ”I am in earnest. I am in earnest. It wouldn't be right of me to let you imagine--to let you think--” she faltered suddenly, for something obstructed her utterance.

The next moment swiftly she covered her face. ”My dear!” he said.

He led her back to the table and made her sit down. He knelt beside her, his arms comfortingly around her.