“Oh! so much!”
“And the horses?” he asked; “how did they go?”
“As usual—oh!” and she caught her breath. “I never thought how they went, I was enjoying it all so much!”
“As usual,” he said, smiling down upon her.
This restlessness of hers was something new to him. The play went on; he neither saw nor heard—but one vision was before him—Gwendoline! That beautiful head, those wondrous eyes, that white neck, those shapely arms, that perfect form of which he had seen the outlines beneath the flimsy covering of a boy’s suit—those charms would drive him mad!
The raging fire of a long pent up passion was consuming him as he gazed upon her. And, as one in a wild and vivid dream, he gazed; the yearning to take her unto himself was overpowering—the desire to hold to his heart that soft, white, heaving breast and feel the quivering of that beautiful form which had bestrode Cliquot.
The air around became hushed and close, and a choking sensation filled his throat. Her white, ungloved hands lay like snowflakes in her lap. He touched them and whispered:
“Let me see them!”
She held them up a little.
“God bless those hands!” he said, hoarsely.