“Here she is, Mr. Castello—my spoiled, willful little girl; and now I will leave you alone with her to plead your own cause,” he exclaimed, thus informally introducing Violet and making his escape.
They were left alone in the long, magnificent drawing-room, the dark, handsome man, and the fair, beautiful girl. She stood still, with downcast eyes a moment, then lifted them shudderingly to his eager face.
He sprang forward and tried to take her hand, but she hid it in the snowy folds of her gown.
“Dear Violet, how glad, how rapturously happy I am to meet you again!” he exclaimed, in a low and musical voice.
She was trembling so that she could not stand, and sinking into a chair, with a weary sigh, she essayed to speak:
“Harold Castello, words of love are wasted between you and me! You do not love me. Why profess to do so? It is ghastly fear for your own safety, not true love, that impels you to bind my life to yours.”
CHAPTER XIX.
“I LOVE YOU AS MADLY AS YOU HATE ME!”
As Harold Castello looked at Violet and listened to her words, his dusky complexion grew lividly pale, and his eyes dilated with something like horror.
Darting close to her side, he bent close to her ear, whispering, hoarsely:
“Speak lower. What if you should be overheard, girl?”