CHAPTER XX.
THE PARTING.
They had been talking for more than an hour. He had given her the whole history of the royal wedding, of what his embassy consisted of, of the length of time he would be absent, how he should think of her continually, how he implored her to write to him every day, and she had given him every detail of her interview with Mr. Sewell and Lady Lanswell. Then he said to himself that it was time they made some arrangement over the future.
"So we are to live apart until next June, Leone," he said, gently. "It is a terrible sentence; but the time will soon pass. Tell me, my darling, where you would like to live until June comes?"
She looked at him with startled eyes.
"Need I leave home, Lance? Let me live here; I could not fancy any other place was home. I feel as though if I once left here I should never see you again."
"My darling, that is all fancy—nothing but fancy. No matter where you are, my birthday comes on the thirtieth day of June, and on that day I shall return to you to make you what I have always believed you to be—my wife."
"I am your wife, Lance; let others say what they will, you will not deny it."
"Not I, Leone. You are my wife; and the very first day the law permits you shall bear my name, just as you now share my heart and life."
"On the thirtieth day of June," she sighed. "I shall count every hour, every minute until then. I wish, Lance, I could sleep a long sleep from the hour of parting until the hour of meeting—if I could but turn my face from the light of day and not open my eyes until they rest on you again. I shall have to live through every hour and every minute, and they will be torture."