Then suddenly she rose and stretched out her hands to keep him from her. “Ah, but this is madness,” she cried. “The passing romance of a forest holiday.”
“No, no,” he protested. “Philippa, my love, how can you say that?”
“What could you do,” she went on, “but make love to me, after our first strange encounter and our meetings in the glamour of the forest. And then under the shadow of the dragon’s castle of Rozsnyo. Is not Perseus bound to imagine himself in love with Andromeda? Ah, Osbert Von Tressen, do not deceive yourself.”
So fearing, questioning, protesting, she kept him, all to prove his love, at arm’s length, till at last conviction was so insistent that she could no longer even pretend a doubt.
“Ah, love me, dear one,” she whispered, as his arms were round her again, “for my love is more than I can tell.”
“Not the romance of the forest,” he murmured slily.
“Ah, darling, yes; for that is you. I should hate the forest instead of loving it had you not been in it. Now, dear,” she continued with a serious face, “our love must be a secret—hush! only for a little time; just while we are here.”
“A secret?” he exclaimed in surprise. “From your father?”
“Yes, even from him. It is only for a little while. You will not mind, dear?”
He was troubled at the idea of a secret where no mystery should be. Galabin’s suspicions about Philippa and her father came to his mind; and yet, when he looked into her eyes they seemed to give the lie to any suggestion of wrong or deceit.