‘You are at home,’ he said gently. ‘Here it will be for you to command, for all to obey.’
She stood before him in one of the embrasures of the windows; the cream-hued velvet of her travelling-dress trimmed with sable, caught the rays of the setting sun.
‘You are châtelaine of Amyôt,’ he added, with a smile. ‘Here I shall be but the first of your servants.’
The words were gracious, and even tender, but they touched her with a sense of chillness; she felt, without knowing why she felt it, that it was not with this courteous ceremony that he would have welcomed her if he had loved her—much.
She said nothing, though she coloured a little as he kissed her hands.
She moved to one of the great windows and looked out a little wistfully towards the rolling waters, the deep, dark brown forests with their purple shadows. The dim afternoon light spread over the landscape without, and through the gorgeous and majestic chambers, which had once heard the love words of the Valois. She had laid her hat down on a table near, the lingering glow of the dying day fell on her white throat, on her cheek with its changing colour, on the knot of orange blossom fastened amongst the lace at her breast; she thrilled through all her nerves as she suddenly realised that she was altogether his, to be used as he chose, never to be apart from him unless by his wish.
She gazed at the scene around her, troubled, perplexed, wistfully, vaguely alarmed, afraid she knew not of what; whilst he watched her with a certain futile anger against himself that her loveliness did not excite him and content him more, a remorseful sense that he was not the lover she merited and should have won.
A sort of self-reproach moved him as he looked at her in her innocence, which seemed too holy a thing to be profaned by the grossness of sensual approach—on the morrow she would not look at him with those serene, childlike eyes.
It seemed to him almost cruel to rouse that perfect innocence from its unsuspicious repose.
Before he could speak again she had turned towards him; her lips trembled a little as she gathered her courage and said aloud what had been in her thoughts all the day through.