It seemed to her enough. The light devil-may-care words surely covered a pledge from him to her—something in return from him to her. At last, surely he was hers, and her wishes his law. It was her moment; she would ask of him now the uttermost wish of her heart—the wish that had displaced all else—the passionate wish not to lose him—not, as it were, to be emptied of him.
"And Omofaga?" she whispered.
His eyes looked past her, out into the dim twilight, into the broad world—the world that she seemed to ask him to give for her, as she was giving her world for him. He laughed again, but not as he had laughed before. There was a note of wonder in his laugh now—of wonder that the prayer seemed now not so utterly absurd—that he could imagine himself doing even that—spoiling his heart of its darling ambition—for her. Yet, even in that moment of her strongest sway, as her arms were about him, he was swearing to himself that he would not.
She did not press for an answer. A glance into his distant eyes gave her one, perhaps, for she sighed as though in pain. Hearing her, he bent his look on her again. Though he might deny that last boon, he had given her much. So she read; and, drawing herself to her full height, she released one of her hands from his, and held it out to him. For a moment he hesitated; then a slow smile breaking on his face, he bent and kissed it, and she whispered over his bent head, half in triumph, half in apology for bidding him bend his head even in love,
"I like pretending to be queen—even with you, Willie."
Her flattery, so sweet to him, because it was wrung from her all against her will, and was for him alone of men, thrilled through him and he was drawing her to him again when the merry chatter of a child struck on their ears from the garden.
She shrank back.
"Hark!" she murmured. "They're coming."
"Yes," he said, with a frown. "I shall come to-morrow, Maggie."
"To-morrow? Every day?" said she.