The words came driven between clenched teeth, chokingly. Her face was milk-white and her eyes blazed at him out of its pallor. She felt as if her heart were beating in her throat, stifling her, and for a little space sheer physical stress held her silent But she fought it back, asserting her will against her weakness.
“How dare you?” There was bitter anger in her still tones. “How dare you touch me—like that?”
With a swift movement she passed her handkerchief across her lips and then let it fall on the ground as though it were something unclean. He winced at the gesture; for a moment the passion died out of his face and a rueful look, almost of schoolboy shame, took its place.
“Do you—feel like that about it?” he said, nodding towards the handkerchief.
“Just like that,” she returned. “Do you think—if I had known—I would ever have risked being alone with you? But I thought we were friends—I never dreamed I couldn’t trust you.”
“Well, you can’t,” he said unsteadily. The sight of her slender, defiant figure and lovely, tilted face, with the scornful lips he had just kissed showing like a scarlet stain against its whiteness, sent the blood rioting through his veins once more. “You’ll... you’ll never be able to trust any man who loves you, Jean.”
Her thoughts flew to Blaise. She would trust herself with him—now, at any time, always. But then, perhaps—the after thought came like a knife-thrust—perhaps he did not care!
“A man who—loved me,” she said dully, “would not do what you’ve just done.”
“He would—sooner or later. Unless his veins ran milk and water!” He drew a step nearer and stood staring down at her sombrely. “Do you know what you’re like, I wonder? With your great golden eyes and your maddening mouth and that little cleft in your white chin.... You’re angry because I kissed you. I wonder I didn’t do it before! I’ve wanted to, dozens of times. But I wanted your love more than a passing kiss. I’ve waited for that—waited all these weeks. And now you refuse it—you’ve not even understood that you’re all earth and heaven to me. God! How blind you must have been!”
She was silent. Her anger was waning, giving place to a certain distressful comprehension of the mighty force which had suddenly broken bondage in the man beside her. Dimly, from her own knowledge of the yearning bred of the loved one’s nearness, she envisaged what these last weeks must have meant to a man of Burke’s temperament. Was it any wonder, when suddenly made to realise that the woman he loved not only did not love him in return, but had failed even to sense his love for her, that his stormy spirit had rebelled—flung off its shackles? An element of self-reproach tinctured her thoughts. In a measure the fault had been hers; her self-absorption was to blame.