"No-o, papa."
"And you don't like any one else better?"
"Papa, you know I don't."
"My own spotless darling! And you will let Sir Everard love you, and be your true and tender husband?"
"Oh, papa, don't!"
She flung herself down with a vehement cry. But Sir Everard turned his radiant, hopeful, impassioned face upon the Indian officer.
"For God's sake, plead my cause, sir! She will listen to you. I love her with all my heart and soul. I will be miserable for life without her."
"You hear, Harrie? This vehement young wooer—make him happy. Make me happy by saying 'Yes.'"
She looked up with the wild glance of a stag at bay. For one moment her frantic idea was flight.
"My love—my life!" Sir Everard caught both her hands across the bed, and his voice was hoarse with its concentrated emotion. "You don't know how I love you. If you refuse I shall go mad. I will be the truest, the tenderest husband ever man was to woman."