"You--you will love me?"
"You must not ask that of me. I am still Lady Huntingford, a wife for all we know. Yet if I loved you, I would tell you so. Have I not told you that I cannot love? I have never loved. I never shall. Don't look like that, Hugh. I would to God I could love you," she exclaimed. His chin had sunk upon his breast and his whole body relaxed through sheer dejection.
"I'll make you love me!" he cried after a moment's misery in the depths, his spirits leaping high with the quick recoil. His eager hands seized her shoulders and drew her close, so close that their bodies touched and his impassioned eyes were within a few inches of hers of startled blue. "I'll make you love me!"
"Please let me go. Please, Hugh," she murmured faintly.
"You must--you shall love me! I cannot live without you. I'll have you whether you will or no," he whispered fiercely.
She did not draw back, but looked him fairly in the eye as she spoke coldly, calmly, even with a sneer.
"You are master here and I am but a helpless woman. Would you force me to forget that you have been my ideal man?"
"Tennys!" he cried, falling back suddenly. "You don't think I would harm you--oh, you know I didn't mean that! What must you think of me?"
He put his hand over his eyes as if in deep pain, and, turning away, leaned against the tree unsteadily. With his first words, his first expression, she knew she had wronged him. A glad rush of blood to her heart set it throbbing violently.
She could not have explained the thrill that went through her when he grasped her shoulders, nor could she any more define the peculiar joy that came when she took a step forward and placed her hands gently, timidly on his arm.