“Well, dear,” he replied in whimsical apology, “compared with the daughter of a man who owns half a city—compared with what you might have had!” He looked into her eyes. “Helen! You won’t regret? They’ll rub it in to you—the title you’ve thrown away—the position in society—what they’ll be pleased to term your hole and corner marriage——”
She laughed happily.
“Oh, Jim!—I’ve got you and you’ve got me—and nothing else matters—it seems to me that you and I are the only two people in the world!” She assured herself of a tightening of his embrace with a touch of her hand on his as she looked up into his eyes with a slow, smiling shake of the head that affirmed her love. “As if only you and I ever existed—and had always loved! As if all through eternity we had waited for this! As if I was born to be just Jim Dacres’s wife!”
He looked down upon her, eyes into eyes.
“Darling!” His voice was low and earnest in a sincerity beyond doubt. “Jim Dacres’s wife you are—and, please God, I’ll never let you go!”
With one more kiss she disengaged herself, came into the centre of the room, threw her fur coat back from the shoulders with a smile that invited the assistance he was prompt to give.
“Are we all alone?” she asked, glancing round, struck by the quietude of the flat.
“All alone, dear,” he replied, folding her coat over a chair. “I told Mrs. Wilkinson she could go out. I thought it would be good to have it all to ourselves for this first evening—you and I alone in Paradise, darling!” He kissed her, drew her toward the fire. “Warm yourself, my beauty—and pretend it is my heart!” He squeezed her shoulders with broad, strong hands.
She shook her head at him in roguish reproof, as she spread her fingers—the new gold ring upon one of them—before the blaze he stirred.
“Pretty, pretty!” she rebuked him. “Where has Jim Dacres learned to make love, I should like to know!”