"Katje," demanded Hartmann, abashed at his own audacity, yet unable to keep back the words, "were you afraid I wouldn't be here in the morning to tell you I loved you? Was that why you said——?"
"How did you know?" she gasped appalled. "You read my mind."
Before she could realise the meaning of what she had said, she found herself whirled bodily from the floor and caught close in the grip of two strong arms that crushed her to a heaving breast. And Hartmann was raining kisses on her hair, her eyes, her upturned face.
"James!" she panted. "Don't! Put me down."
"Not till you say you love me," came the answer in a voice from whence all timidity had forever fled.
The tone of glad, adoring rulership thrilled her. She ceased her half-hearted struggles to free herself. Her arms, through no conscious effort of her own, crept upward until they encircled his neck.
"Say you love me!" he demanded again, in that glorious Mastery of the Loved.
"I love you," she answered obediently. "I have always loved you, I think. It's—it's very wonderful to be held like this and—and to be glad not to be let go. I—I—I don't really think I wanted you to let me go, even when I told you to."
"There is something else you must say before I let you go," he demanded, drunk with his new-born power and happiness.
"Yes? I'll say it."