"Nonsense, Mr. Armstrong! Remember, we are strangers."
"We are not! Feel my heart!"—and, suddenly seizing her hand, he pressed it against his heart, so that she felt its quick strong throbs. "Could a stranger make my heart beat like this? Miss Grahame—Lina——Oh, I don't mind if you are angry! You are Lina to me in my thoughts and dreams. Lina, why do you try so hard to hate me? For you are trying; I can see it in your eyes, which seek mine until you hastily avert them; I can feel it in your hand, which half returns my pressure before you snatch your fingers from me. Lina, why do you try to steel your heart against me? What have I done, dear, that you should refuse to follow your heart and love me as I love you?"
CHAPTER XV.
A sudden rage seized Laline against both Wallace and herself. She hated herself for tolerating and even liking him, and she hated him for what she regarded as his unparalleled duplicity.
"You are asking me a great many questions!" she said, turning a white, angry face upon him. "Now I want to question you! Tell me, if you have the slightest regard for truth—do you know of no tie, no responsibility, which should prevent you from making love to me?"
"What do you mean?" he asked, falling back a step and speaking in low troubled tones, quite unlike the passionate accents of his first love-avowal.
"You answer my question by asking another!" she exclaimed, stamping her foot impatiently. "What I want you to tell me is this—is there nothing and no one to stand between us—no barrier which should keep you and me apart?"
The flush of excitement faded from his dark face, which in a moment seemed to age and grow stern and sad. For the first time he averted his eyes from hers.