“Don’t be frightened. It’s Peter,” he called beneath his breath.
She was coming. Soon she would look out. He saw her, leaning down on him, white clad, with her dark hair falling all about her face.
“I couldn’t stop away any longer, Cherry. I had to come to you. I want you to promise that you’ll be here to-morrow. When I asked you before you only said, ‘Perhaps.’ Only perhaps, Cherry, after a year of waiting! Promise me, ‘Yes.’”
Was she laughing? Was she angry? He was whispering to her again. “They’d locked all the doors. I was afraid that I’d never get out. I climbed down, when everyone was in bed. I had to come to you.”
“Oh, Peter, Peter!” She wasn’t cross with him. She was laughing. “You’re so persistent. It took you to do that.”
Silence again.
“But promise,” he urged. He wished that he might see her clearly. They had called her Cherry because her lips were red. “But promise. Won’t you say ‘Yes’?”
Her answer came so that he could scarcely hear it. “If I promise, will you go now?”
He nodded like a child, to give emphasis.
“Then yes—but only if you go now at once.”