"I was afraid he might become excited and shoot you," I returned simply. And he bent over and took my hand.
"I hoped that was it," he said, just as simply. He did not relinquish my hand.
(When I told Daphne the story I merely said of this: "I dried myself by the library fire.")
But suddenly I saw something that fairly made my blood chill in my veins. On the floor, at his very feet, the firelight dancing on their polished metal, lay a pair of handcuffs.
"Oh!" I cried and jumped to my feet, pointing. "You haven't been telling me the truth. They have given you a few minutes, and then they are coming back to take you away. Oh, don't let them to do it. I couldn't stand it!"
Yes, that is what I said. It was utterly shameless, of course, and no properly-behaved young woman would ever have said it. But no properly-behaved young woman would have kidnapped a Prime Minister, anyhow, and sat in a strange house while her hostess was asleep, drinking tea at four o'clock in the morning.
When I stood up he stood up, too, and looked down at me. "It is worth while having been a brute and a villain," he said soberly, "to hear that. I am not under arrest or going to be. The fact is that two entirely different and—if you will forgive me—nefarious schemes have been under way at the same time, and the lines crossed. You and I got tangled in them and nearly submerged. But that was not accident; it was destiny." He took my other hand.
At that absorbing moment the footman announced cautiously that the motor was at the door. It was horribly disappointing. From destiny to motor wraps is such a descent.
"Do we have to go right away?" I said.