“Oh, please, let me go. I must see to my packing—indeed I must,” cried Kate, so startled and moved by the suddenness of the attack, and by his evident excitement, that she could scarcely keep from tears.
“Not now,” said John, in her ear—“not now. I must have my answer. You cannot be so cruel as to go now. Only half an hour—only ten minutes—Kate!”
“Hush! oh hush!” she cried, feeling herself conquered; and ere she knew, the night air was blowing in her face, and the dark sky, with its faint little summer stars, was shining over her, and John Mitford, holding her close, with her hand on his arm, was bending over her, a dark shadow. She could not read in his face all the passion that possessed him, but she felt it, and it made her tremble, woman of the world as she was.
“Kate,” he said, “I cannot go searching for words now. I think I will go mad if you don’t speak to me. Tell me what I am to hope for. Give me my answer. I cannot bear any more.”
His voice was hoarse; he held her hand fast on his arm, not caressing, but compelling. He was driven out of all patience; and for the first time in her life Kate’s spirit was cowed, and her wit failed to the command of the situation.
“Let me go!” she said; “oh, do let me go! you frighten me, Mr John.”
“Don’t call me Mr John. I am your slave, if you like; I will be anything you please. You said just now we belonged to each other; so we do. No, I can’t be generous; it is not the moment to be generous. I have a claim upon you—don’t call me Mr John.”
“Then what shall I call you?” Kate said, with a little hysterical giggle. And all at once, at that most inappropriate moment, there flashed across her mind the first name she had recognised his identity by. My John—was that the alternative? She shrank a little and trembled, and did not know whether she should laugh or cry. Should she call him that just as an experiment, to see how he would take it?—or what else could she do to escape from him out of this dark place, all full of dew, and odours, and silence, into the light and the safety of her own room? And yet all this time she made no attempt to withdraw her hand from his arm. She wanted something to lean on at such a crisis, and he was very handy for leaning on—tall, and strong, and sturdy, and affording a very adequate support. “Oh, do let me go!” she burst out all at once. “It was only for your own good I spoke to you; I did not mean—this. Why should you do things for me? I don’t want—to make any change. I should like to have you always just as we have been—friends. Don’t say any more just yet—listen. I like you very very much for a friend. You said yourself we were like brother and sister. Oh, why should you vex me and bother me, and want to be anything different?” said Kate, in her confusion, suddenly beginning to cry without any warning. But next moment, without knowing how it was, she became aware that she was crying very comfortably on John’s shoulder. Her crying was more than he could bear. He took her into his arms to console her without any arrière pensée. “Oh, my darling, I am not worth it,” he said, stooping over her. “Is it for me—that would never let the wind blow on you? Kate! I will not trouble you any more.” And with that, before he was aware, in his compunction and sympathy, his lips somehow found themselves close to her cheek. It was all to keep her from crying—to show how sorry he was for having grieved her. His heart yearned over the soft tender creature. What did it matter what he suffered, who was only a man? But that Kate should cry!—and that it should be his fault! He felt in his simplicity that he was giving her up for ever, and his big heart almost broke, as he bent down trembling, and encountered that soft warm velvet cheek.
How it happened I cannot tell. He did not mean it, and she did not mean it. But certainly Kate committed herself hopelessly by crying there quite comfortably on his shoulder, and suffering herself to be kissed without so much as a protest. He was so frightened by his own temerity, and so surprised at it, that even had she vindicated her dignity after the first moment, and burst indignant from his arms, John would have begged her pardon with abject misery, and there would have been an end of him. But somehow Kate was bewildered, and let that moment pass; and after the surprise and shock which his own unprecedented audacity wrought in him, John grew bolder, as was natural. She was not angry; she endured it without protest. Was it possible that in her trouble she was unconscious of it? And involuntarily John came to see that boldness was now his only policy, and that it must not be possible for her to ignore the facts of the case. That was all simple enough. But as for Kate, I am utterly unable to explain her conduct. Even when she came to herself, all she did was to put up her hands to her face, and to murmur piteously, humbly, “Don’t! oh, please, don’t!” And why shouldn’t he, when that was all the resistance she made?
After this, the young man being partly delirious, as might have been expected, it was Kate who had to come to the front of affairs and take the lead. “Do, please, be rational now,” she said, shaking herself free all in a moment. “And give me your arm, you foolish John, and let us take a turn round the garden. Oh, what would your mother say if she knew how ridiculous you have been making yourself? Tell me quietly what it is you want now,” she added, in her most coaxing tone, looking up into his face.