Her eyes were fixed upon his face. They were in the shadow of the tinted lamp-shade, but they had a light of their own—a languorous, alluring glow. He had never looked into such eyes before; they fascinated him, and he knew, in a delicious trembling, that his own were answering them in kind.
“You can read to me now,” she said, the rapt, wistful gaze melting into a smile. “He will not come to-night.”
Seth took the story, as she gave it to him from her workbox, and glanced over it to pick up the thread of the narrative where it had been dropped. As he was still thus engaged, he felt her hand laid upon his, and, as their eyes met again, heard her low, soft voice murmur:
“Do you know why I declined our invitation for the husking?”
There was a silence, which the young man felt that his face made full of acquiescent meaning.
She answered her own question: “I wanted you here, all for myself.”
Seth lost himself in an uplifting, floating sensation of ethereal beatitude. Her hand was in his now, warm and palpitating, and he raised it to his lips. It was difficult to breathe, but the oppression in his breast was all delight. He rose to his feet, his arms outstretched, his heart beating in exultant tumult. He heard her whisper—he could scarcely see her for the magnetic waving before his eyes—the refrain of the story: “So strong and yet so gentle!” His lips were formed for the passionate utterance—already framed in his heart—“My darling!” when there came the sound of footsteps on the path without, and of a hand upon the latch.
Seth mechanically took up the manuscript of his article, and turned toward the door. Beneath an impassive mien, far more composed than he dared to hope, there was the sensation of being hurled down, down, through the air, to unwelcome earth.
It was Albert. He looked at the two cursorily but closely, and only said, as he tossed his bag into a chair:
“Train was late. You go to bed at once, Isabel. I have particular business with Seth.”