"What is it?" he said at last.
"If I might put the child down," she suggested timidly.
Lucas pointed to the double-doors of his bedroom. "My bed is in there," he answered. She lowered her head, as though in obedience to a command he had given, and carried the child out. Lucas watched her go, and then crossed the room to a cupboard which contained, among other things, a bottle of brandy.
While he was drinking she returned, pausing in the door to look back at the child. He noticed that she left the door partly open to hear it if it should wake, and somehow this struck him as particularly moving.
She came across the room to him, with her steadfast eyes on his face, and, without speaking, fell on her knees before him and put the edge of his coat to her lips.
Lucas stood while she did it; he hardly dared to move and interrupt that reverent and symbolic act of gratitude. But once again, as when on the pavement she had held the child to him in frantic appeal, the simple soul within him flamed into splendor, and he was in touch with great passions and mighty emotions. It is the mood of martyrs and heroes. He looked down to her dark eyes, bright with swimming tears, and helped her to her feet.
"You shall be safe here," he told her. "Nobody shall touch you here."
She believed it utterly; he was a champion sent straight from God; she had seen him conquering and irresistible. To fear now would be a blasphemy.
"I am quite safe," she agreed. "I am not afraid. To-morrow some of my people will come for me."
He nodded. "There is some food in the cupboard there," he told her. "Milk, too, if the child wants it. And nobody can come up the stairs without meeting me; and if they try, God help them!"