"Very well." She felt tired suddenly. "I will write—to-morrow. But—but you won't be angry if it's no?" Toni added childishly.
"I'd never be angry—with you." The young man's commonplace features were irradiated by a great light, and for a moment one could forget his mean stature and ready-made clothing. "You will never understand—you couldn't—what you are to me; but before God," said Leonard Dowson solemnly, "I'd devote my life, my soul, all I have to your service, and never ask for thanks."
"Well, if you will go now, I will write to you," said Toni, rather wearily; and his passion was checked by the fatigue in her voice.
"I'll go now—at once—and you—you will write, Toni? I'll count every moment till I get your letter."
"Yes, I will write," she reiterated dully, wishing he would go and leave her alone with her thoughts; and without another word he turned and vanished into the shadows.
When the sound of his footsteps had died away and all was silence, Toni shivered with a feeling of deadly chill.
Leonard Dowson's appearance, following so closely on Eva Herrick's suggestions, had given her a queer, eerie sensation of awe, as though some inexorable fate were pointing out to her a way of escape from the situation she was beginning to find intolerable. She never doubted the man's affection for her; and she fully believed that he would indeed die in her service. And the very touch of fanaticism in her love for Owen, which made her feel that it would be a small thing indeed to die for him if by dying she might give him happiness, helped her to realize the strength of the pallid, unromantic young dentist's devotion.
True, Toni was too innately sensible a person—perhaps it would be fairer to say her love of life and its "sweet things" was too strong—to allow her to contemplate death as a solution of the problem of her unsuccessful marriage.
She understood, too, with a queer flash of spiritual insight which was foreign to her usual simple vision, that her death would bring Owen only a great sorrow; and in her darkest moments she never dreamed of courting death.
A sudden bark from Jock made her start; and looking round she found Owen almost at her elbow. He had dismissed his taxi at the gate, and was walking briskly up the dark avenue, when Jock's vociferous welcome broke the night silence and brought him to a halt.