"If you will forgive me," he continued, recovering his senses, "and will allow me the sweet privilege of your friendship, I promise never again to speak of my love until you have given me permission. Shall it be a compact?"
"Yes," murmured the girl.
"Will you give me your hand?" he asked. She offered the hand, and he clasping it, said:—
"You have much to forgive, but your heart is full of gentleness, and you have promised."
"Yes, I have promised," she returned huskily.
"Good night, Rita."
"Good night."
The girl hurried to her room, and, almost unconscious of what she was doing, dressed for the night. During the first few minutes after she had extinguished the candle and had crept into bed, she could not think coherently, but soon consciousness came in an ingulfing flood. Williams's kisses seemed to stick to her. She rubbed her lips till they were raw, but still the clinging pollution seemed to penetrate to her soul. Her first coherent thought, of course, was of Dic. No man but he had ever, till that night, touched her lips, and with him a kiss was a sacrament. Now he would scorn her. The field of her disaster seemed to broaden, as she thought of it, and with the chastity of her lips she felt that she had lost everything worth having in life. Abandoning her pillow, she covered her head with the counterpane, and drawing her knees to her breast, lay trembling and sobbing. Dic was lost to her. There seemed to be no other possible outcome to the present situation. She feared Williams as never before, and felt that she was in his clutches beyond escape. The situation seemed hopeless beyond even the reach of prayer, her usual refuge, and she did not pray. She knew of her father's debt to Williams, and had always feared that Tom was not to be trusted. She was convinced without evidence other than Williams's words that he had told the truth, and she knew that ruin and disgrace for her father and Tom waited upon a nod from the man whom she hated, and that the nod waited upon her frown.
The next morning Rita's face lacked much of its wonted beauty. Her eyes were red and dim, the cheeks were pale and dim, her lips were blue and dim, and all the world, seen by her eyes, was dark and dim. The first thing that must be done, of course, was to tell Dic of the ravaged kiss. She had no more desire to conceal that terrible fact from him than a wounded man has to deceive the surgeon. He must be told without delay, even should he at once spurn her forever.
She feared Williams, bearing in mind his threat, and determined first to pledge Dic to secrecy, and then to tell him of her disgrace. She wrote to him, begging him to come to her at once; and he lost no time in going.