Nay, my lord—thas jus me! I jus a liddle echo!
She had learned the voice of the nightingale.
THE NIGHTINGALE SONG
With an exclamation of indescribable tenderness he drew her into his arms, and for a few moments at least all the misery and pain and constraint of the last few weeks between them passed away and gave place to all their pent-up love and loneliness.
As he held her close to him, he was conscious at first only of the fact that she loved him, that she was clinging to him with somewhat of her old abandon, and then he felt her hands upon his arms. He could almost see them shaking and trembling. She was attempting to release herself! Struggling to be free! All of a sudden he released her, and stood breathing hard, his arms folded across his breast, waiting for her to do or say something to him.
She did not move. She stood before him, with her head down; and then her blue eyes lifted, and timidly, appealingly, they beseeched his own. She started to speak, stammered only a few incoherent words, and then, with a half-sob, she unsteadily crossed the room and left him alone.