"What an age, what an eternity it has been," he profoundly sighed. "I have grown grey waiting for this instant."
She studied him, with amusement.
"The grey is very skilfully concealed," she remarked.
"The grey is in my soul," said he, with the accent of tragedy.
"Well—?" he again demanded.
"Well what?" teased she, arching her eye-brows innocently.
"Oh, come," he remonstrated. "Don't torture a defenceless animal. Seal my fate, pronounce my doom. I love you—love you—love you. Will you have me?"
She stood silhouetted against a window, the light sifting and shining through her hair.
"I have a condition to make," she said. "You must promise to comply with my condition—and then I can answer you."
Her dark eyes smiled into his, quizzically, but perhaps with a kind of tenderness too.
He came nearer.