"Love me, or I die!"
"My--my dear young lady!" stammered the curate.
"You will be my murderer!"
The accent with which these words were spoken was indescribable, as indescribable as the music which accompanied them. It may be doubted if, as he heard them, it was not the Rev. Alan himself who was going mad. The heat and agitation brought on by the pace at which his aunt had marched him from Cadogan Place, the extraordinary manner of his reception at Pomona Villa, the still more extraordinary things which had happened to him since he had got inside; all these, put together, were quite enough to make him uncertain as to whether he were standing on his head or his heels. And then, for him, a staunch believer in the theory, and the practice, of the celibate priest, to have such language addressed to him, after five minutes' acquaintance, by a total stranger! and such a pianist! and a fine young woman! No wonder the Rev. Alan put his hand up to his head under the impression that that portion of his frame was leaving him.
"If you do not marry me," continued this extraordinary young woman, in tones which harrowed his heart--and yet which were not so harrowing as her music, by a very great deal, "I shall die before your eyes."
The Rev. Alan still had his hand to his head. He looked round him with bewildered, short-sighted eyes. Curiously enough his aunt still had her face turned in the opposite direction.
"I--I'm sure--" he stammered.
"Of what?"
"I--I shall be happy--"
"Happy!"