“Curious voice you have,” he said, without attention to her question, in his haphazard jumping way. “Wish you’d go on talking. It makes me drowsy—feeling of green fields, little swishing brooks, and multitudes of silver leaves sweeping the skies. I love your voice.”
“Let me take care of you to-night.”
“Why, what would you do?” he said, jerking up his head.
“Let’s start right by making a home out of this.”
“A home?”
The allusion was unfortunate, for he broke into a laugh, starting up and seizing her arm, while the excitement seemed to pile up within him.
“No, no; I’ll tell you what I’m going to do a night like this. I’m going to break loose—stop this eternal, maddening fighting to hold myself in—give way!” His voice had risen into rapid, shrill notes, and she noticed that his eyes had taken on the unseeing shimmer. “Give way—give way! Stop living as others want you—let the world roar about you. What’s it matter—whom does it hurt—who cares the slightest?”
He seized his hat, and, turning toward her, flung an arm around her, holding her to him as though to sweep her up and out in his breathless progress.
“Will you do that? Just to-night? Just for one night? Will you follow me to-night?”
“No, I will not,” she said firmly, though into her eyes leaped something untamed at the gusty, wild embrace in which he had caught her. “And you won’t go, either.”