"I don't always succeed with the one I am leaning against just now!"
"Well, I'll swear it's not your fault if you fail," he answered, smiling down upon her with such unfathomable sadness in his eyes, that she cried out involuntarily, between vexation and despair—
"Oh, mon Dieu, is it always going to be like this between us? Is there nothing I can do to make you happy again?"
"Nothing just at present, worse luck," he said grimly, looking straight ahead: for in the face of such an appeal he could hardly confess his desperate need to be left alone. "It's a question of time, as I told you, and my own strength of will. But if the situation becomes too intolerable for you, there is always the last resort of overstepping the limit, and setting you free for good."
Quita could not know how cruelly ill he had slept since her coming, nor how little a man tortured by insomnia can be held responsible for his utterances; and the significance of his last words so startled her that she clutched his arm.
"Eldred . . . Eldred, promise me you'll never even think of such a thing . . . never!"
He winced under her touch. "Quita, remember where we are," he said sharply; and she dropped her hand.
"But all the same, promise me . . what I asked; or I shall never have an easy moment."
"It might come to seem the kindest thing one could do for you," he persisted, still without looking at her. But fear gave her courage to strike deep while the chance of speech was hers.
"It would never be anything less than an act of cruelty and cowardice. Remember that. I am ready to put up with everything . . . everything rather than lose you, now."