'Good heavens, that sensation again!' he exclaimed.
'I must struggle against it, or it will conquer me,' she said, suddenly regaining her firmness and striving to crush or shake off the nervous emotion that shook her fragile form and gentle spirit.
'My darling, I am to blame; oh, pardon me, if I, at a time when your health—your nervous system, at least—so selfishly urge my claim upon your heart, for a strong and tender claim I have, indeed, Ida.'
There was in this an eloquence greater than more florid phrases could express, as he spoke, for it seemed as if Jerry's very soul was spent in what he said. After a pause, he said, with an arm still round her:
'I will not press you to answer me now, dearest Ida; you are pale and seem so weary. I will go, but ere I do so, give me one kiss in memory of the past, if not to encourage hope for the future.'
She lifted her sweet face to his, and there was infinite tenderness, but no passion in the kiss she accorded him so frankly; and Vane was but too sensible of that; while a sound like a deep sigh fell at the same moment on the ears of both.
'Who sighed?' she asked, startled, in the fear that they were overseen or overheard; 'did you, Jerry?'
'No; yourself, perhaps, darling.'
'Nay—I sigh often enough, but I did not do so now, Jerry.'
'Most strange! We must have deceived ourselves, for here are people coming,' he added, as steps were heard in the outer drawing-room. 'You will give me a final answer, then?' he urged, in a deep, soft whisper.