At that moment Leo opened her eyes again, with a calm, soft light seeming to burn therein, as she smiled in his face and drew his hand more to her pillow so that she could rest her cheek upon it, and once more her eyes half closed; but he knew that she was gazing at him still with the same soft, loving look which, in spite of his self-control, made his heart beat with a dull, heavy throb.
“I have so longed to tell you all this,” she whispered; “but I never dared till now. It has made me bitter, and distant, and strange to you. I was angry with myself for loving you; and yet I could not help it. You made me love you. I always did—I always shall.”
“It is delirium,” panted North. “I will not listen to her. Pah! it is absurd. Where is my manliness—where are all my honourable feelings? I can master such folly, and I will.”
He set his teeth, and his face grew hard and cold; but all the same his pulses quickened, and as he sat prisoned there, with those soft, lustrous eyes gazing into his, he found that he was dreaming of another life in which his scientific researches would be forgotten in the sweet, dreamy, sensuous existence which would be his—enlaced in that loving embrace, while those eyes gazed in his as they were gazing now, and those curved lips returned his kisses or murmured tenderly as once more they whispered the secrets of her breast.
“It has been so long. I have been so ill: but I do not complain, for it has made me free to speak to you as I speak now. No, no; don’t take away your hand. Let me rest like that.”
He was softly stealing away his hand, but she clung to it the more tightly, and her white teeth glistened between her ruby lips in a smile that was half mocking.
He heaved a deep sigh, and resigned himself to his position, while the new thoughts which came surging on in a flood began to sweep everything before them. She had been delirious, but there was no delirium here. She loved him. This young and beautiful girl, to whom for years he had given no thought save as the sister of his old friend, loved him passionately, and he knew now the meaning of the ideas which had troubled him for days—he must—he did love her in return.
But he was not beaten yet. A flush rose to his forehead and he set his teeth hard, as he recalled his position—the confidence reposed in him as a medical man—a confidence which he seemed to be abusing; and drawing his breath deeply, he resolved that he would be man enough to resist this temptation now Leo was weak and excited. She was yielding to her impulse as she would not have yielded had she been strong and well; hence he would be taking an unmanly advantage if he trespassed upon her weakness now.
His course was open; his mind clear. He would be tender and kind to her now. After she was well he could listen to her confessions of love as a lover should; and as the thought expanded in his brain that he would call this loving girl wife, he wondered how it was that he could have been so dull and cold before—how it was that love should have been shut from his mental vision as by a veil? And he sat gazing at his patient, almost dazzled by the bright light which seemed to be shed upon his future, till Hartley softly entered the room.
“Any change?” he whispered.