"Don't," she said, "let us think of him."
"How can I help it? He robs me of you."
"No," she rejoined, "not that."
Her hand still rested on his arm, and he took it between both his. The couples in front of them all down the length of stairs paid no heed to them, and through the hum of voices, from a distant room beyond, came softly wafted on the hot, still air the strains of the exquisite barcarolle from the "Contes d' Hoffmann."
Louisa smiled confidently, proudly. He held her hand and she felt that his—hot and dry—quivered in every muscle at her touch. The commonplace woman had opened the magic book of Love. She had turned its first pages, the opening chapters had been simple, unruffled, uncrumpled by the hand of men or of Fate. But now at last she read the chapter which all along she knew was bound to reach her ken. The leaves of the book were crumpled; Fate with cruel hand had tried to blur the writing; the psychological problem of to-day—the one that goes by the name of "modern woman"—would no doubt ponder ere she tried to read further; she would analyze her feelings, her thoughts, her sensations; she would revel over her own heartache and delight in her own soul agony. But simple-minded, conventional Louisa did none of these things. She neither ruffled her hair, nor dressed in ill-made serge clothes; her dress was perfect and her hand exquisitely gloved. She did nothing out of the way; she only loved one man altogether beyond herself, and she understood his passionate love for her, and all that troubled him in this world in which they both lived.
"I love that barcarolle, don't you?" she said after awhile.
"I did not hear it," he replied.
"Luke."
"It's no use, Lou," he said under his breath. "You must despise me for being a drivelling fool, but I have neither eyes nor ears now. I would give all I have in the world to lie down there on the floor now before you and to kiss the soles of your feet."
"How could I despise you, Luke, for that?"