"Certainly not! One couldn't talk with Foster enlarging upon the only rational way of rearing pheasants!" He paused a moment. "You know I'm going away the first thing to-morrow," he added softly.
"Yes; I know. I'm sorry."
"Truly sorry? You mean that?"
He gave her a searching glance and then laid his hand on her shoulder, holding her a little away from him.
"Dear little girl," he said, "you don't know what a struggle it is between the knowledge of the duty I owe you and my own selfish longing—my uncontrollable longing for you. You are very young and beautiful, and I love you—but I am a broken man."
"Does that matter, when it is through no fault of yours?" She smiled up at him as she spoke.
For one instant he hesitated; then, all his good resolutions forgotten, he gathered the girl in his arms.
"Millicent!" he breathed. Then, after a long silence: "We'll laugh at cold-blooded prudence and take our chances. It's a wide world, and we'll find a nook; somewhere if we go out and look for it. All my care will be to smooth the trail for you, dear."
They spent a half-hour in happy talk, and Blake murmured when Millicent protested that they must go back; and she feared that her lover's exultant air would betray them as they entered the drawing-room.
"Where's the key?" Challoner asked.