"Henceforth," said Cecilia, who now saw that her intrigue was progressing towards a complete triumph—even more rapidly than she had ever anticipated—"henceforth you will have no votary more constant in attendance than I; but, on your part, you must occasionally spare from your valuable time a single half hour wherein to impart to me the consolations I so much require."
"Be not afraid, Lady Cecilia," said the rector, who now felt himself attracted towards that woman by a spell of irresistible influence: "I shall not forget that you have ingenuously and frankly sought my spiritual aid; and I should be false to the holy cause in which I have embarked, were I to withhold it."
"I thank you—deeply, sincerely thank you," exclaimed Cecilia. "But judge for yourself whether I do not seek solace, in my domestic afflictions, from the proper source! This is the book which I was reading when you called."
Cecilia took up Sturm's "Reflections," and opened the book at random.
"There," she said; "it was this page which I was perusing."
She held the book in her hands as she reclined, rather than sate, upon the sofa; and the clergyman was compelled to lean over her to obtain a glimpse of the page to which she pointed.
His hair touched hers: she did not move her head. Their faces were close to each other. But not an impure thought entered his soul: still he was again excited by that thrilling sensation which came over him whenever he touched her.
She affected not to perceive that their hair commingled, but pointed to the page, and expatiated upon its contents.
In a moment of abstraction, for which he could not account, and against the influence of which he was not proof, Reginald Tracy's eyes wandered from the book to the form which reclined, beneath his glance, as it were, upon the sofa. That glance swept the well-proportioned undulations of the slight but charming figure which was voluptuously stretched upon the cushions.
Suddenly Cecilia left off speaking, and turned her eyes upward to his countenance. Their glances met; and Reginald did not immediately avert his head. There was something in the depths of those melting blue orbs which fascinated him.