"We belong to each other, and to no one and nothing else," he maintained doggedly. "You can't go on living with one man when you know you love another. It's not right."
"Perhaps not, from one point of view, but I don't take that view. We can't think of ourselves. I shall ask Robert to let me go to the Cuthells, even if I have to pretend to be ill. If he won't let me go, then you must apply for leave, or get away somehow from Rassih."
"Stella, are you made of stone?" He drew his chair nearer to hers, laid his hand on her arm, rejoiced as he felt how her pulses responded to his touch. "Think what the separation would mean. We could go to England," he urged. "I would work for you, slave for you, darling."
"And that would mean your giving up India?"
"Not necessarily. I can take leave on urgent private affairs for six months. Furlough is due to me, too, but that takes time to arrange. I could get it tacked on afterwards, and then—then we could be married and come out together. It would all have blown over."
But even as he spoke there came visions, strive as he would to ignore them, of obscure little stations, promotion tardy, other men passing over his head for the rest of his service.
"And suppose Robert wouldn't—supposing we couldn't be married?"
This possibility had not entered his mind. He hesitated, then added quickly: "He couldn't be such a brute! If he was, I'd retire; we would live quietly somewhere out of the world, just for each other. Don't you care for me enough to take the risk?"
She did not answer, because she feared if she spoke at the moment she might burst into tears. He misunderstood her silence.