"Yes," she said under her breath.
"Are you sure?" he persisted.
She raised her head impulsively, and, with a gesture most winning, most confident, she stretched up her arms to him.
"Yes," she said. "I mean it! I mean it! I want—to be loved!"
His arms were close about her as she ended, and she uttered the last words chokingly with her face against his breast. The effort had cost her all her strength, and she clung to him panting, almost fainting, while panic—wild, unreasoning panic—swept over her. What was this man to whom she had thus impulsively given herself—this man whom all men feared?
Nevertheless, she grew calmer at last, awaking to the fact that though his hold was tense and passionate, he still retained his self-control. She commanded herself, and turned her face upwards.
"Then you do love me?" she said tremulously.
His eyes shone into hers, red as the inner, intolerable glow of a furnace. He did not attempt to make reply in words. He seemed at that moment incapable of speech. He only bent and kissed her fiercely, burningly, even brutally, upon the lips. And so she had her answer.