"Marishka, it is I, Hugh!"
He saw her stare and then take a pace toward him as he clambered into the room, and in a moment she was in his arms.
"Hugh—belovèd!" she murmured brokenly, as she leaned heavily against him. "I have been so frightened——"
"Marishka! Your hands are ice cold. They have kept you here—against your will?"
"Yes. And you—Hugh—they've tried——"
"Don't fear," he smiled. "I've as many lives as a cat. Didn't you hear me scratching my way up the wall? Sh——"
He left her for a moment, and peered out into the darkness of the garden. All was silent as before, and so he returned and took her in his arms again.
"You've forgiven me?" he whispered.
"Need you ask? Oh, Hugh, I've wanted you so!"
"Thank God for that." Their lips met and she clung to him, all the pitiful longings of her days and nights of misery in her caress, the dependence of helpless womanhood, but greater than that, the fear for his safety, which took precedence over her own.