"What power have I beside theirs?" she said, turning away her head. He saw the trembling of the soft throat, and bent over her.
"I only ask you, for both our sakes, not to test it too far!"
And taking her hand by force, he crushed it passionately in his own.
But she was only half appeased. Her mind, indeed, was in that miserable state when love finds its only pleasure in self-torment.
With a secret change of ground she asked him how he was going to spend the day. He answered, reluctantly, that there was a Diocesan Committee that would take the afternoon, and that the morning must be largely given to the preparation of papers.
"But you will come and look in upon me?—you will help me through?"
She raised her shoulders resentfully.
"And you have been, to Whinthorpe already!—Why do you go to Mass every morning?" she asked, looking up. "I know very few Catholics do. I wish you'd tell me."
He looked embarrassed.
"It has been my custom for a long time," he said at last.