"I tell you," he went on impetuously, "I tell you again, as I told you yesterday morning, that nothing matters to me in the world but your love. It means more to me than my work and my aims, my life itself. Without you, success in the Service would simply be dust and ashes. I'd sooner live on a desert island with you than be Viceroy of India. Are you afraid to trust yourself to me?"
She struggled for self-control. His eyes were pleading, his face looked drawn. She longed to give in, to tell him she asked nothing better than to be with him for always, at whatever the price or the punishment. Yet surrender at best must mean greater sacrifice for Philip than she on her side could offer, and she meant to hold out even should it all end in a parting that left Philip with the impression that she valued her worldly well-being beyond his love. Her thoughts were simple, direct; but she felt if she tried to explain, urged the fact that she cared too much for him to become a drag on his life, would find compensation in knowing he was free to go forward untrammelled, she might only appear to be setting herself up on a pedestal of self-righteousness at his expense. She temporised.
"Let us think it over," she entreated; "let us give ourselves time, by one of us going away, at any rate for the present."
"Time would make no difference as far as I am concerned. It would only be the same thing all over again! But if you think it would help you to forget, then of course I must agree."
"Oh, it isn't that," she protested, tortured beyond endurance. She cast about in her mind for further argument. "Do you remember one day when I told you how I regretted I wasn't a man to do what little I could for India, and you said my chance might come?"
"Oh, you sweet, silly child!" he scoffed. "Do you honestly imagine that India would crumble to pieces without me?" He laughed as he seized her in his arms, kissing her madly. She wrenched herself free, stood swaying, confused, overcome with the force of his passion, the thrill of his embrace. Then came the sound of Robert's returning footsteps, and she held up a warning hand, bent over the bowl of flowers on the table as though to rearrange them. Philip moved his chair back to its original position and busied himself with his cigarette case, but he could have wished that Crayfield had surprised them; then there would have been an end to all subterfuge, of all Stella's doubts and scruples. He felt a cur because he did not stand up and proclaim the truth there and then, so setting her free from the onus of decision.
"That's done!" said Robert. "Now, when Sher Singh comes back, perhaps we shall get to the bottom of this pearl business. Are you ready, Flint? We ought to be off again if we're to see to that farther chain of villages. It looks like more rain, thank goodness. Stella, you'd better go and lie down; you look like a ghost."
"I feel like one, too," she answered, and as he turned to leave the room she followed him quickly. "Robert, wait a moment." She caught his elbow. "Come into my room, I want to speak to you."
He acquiesced, though with impatience. "Well, what is it?"