“Nothing. Doesn’t it strike you that all this is rather hard upon me? Surely a wife is entitled to her husband’s confidence. Ever since baby was born you seem to have changed completely. Why does Mr. Drake live with us? What has he to do with this change?”
It was impossible for him to answer the question without revealing everything, and he was quite determined that his wife should not know of the vow that he had made. What could he say to her?
“I believe that he is a good man, but surely it is not necessary to have him constantly with you?” she continued nervously.
“I like Drake, and I am greatly indebted to him.”
“Won’t you give orders to prepare the yacht and let us go away—just you and I—for a long voyage? I think I could be very happy with you—alone,” she said in a low voice, but her eyes were full of appeal.
“I should like nothing better in the world but I can’t do it,” he answered firmly, but he was struggling fiercely with himself to subdue the mad desire to take her in his arms and cover her face with kisses.
“Very well,” she answered coldly, and left him.
CHAPTER XV
Gaunt’s first impulse was to hasten after his wife and accept the proposal she had made. There could be no doubt that she had offered him all that he was struggling to obtain—her love; and if he had agreed to go away on the yacht, they might live the life of which he had dreamed. To do him justice the temptation, though strong, was but momentary, for he quickly remembered that to leave England at the present moment would be to break the vow that he had made.
“No. I will win her and yet be honest to myself,” he said grimly.