Nevertheless, I was really delighted to hear her give in to my authority for once; perhaps had I been more steadfast in the past—— But what was the use of lamenting what was beyond recall?
“Then we are to be permitted the pleasure of saving you from this strange peril that hangs over you?” I asked, trying to appear quite calm.
“I will leave this house with you,” she replied.
It would have pleased me better had she shown fuller confidence in my willingness and ability to protect her, but the old spirit appeared to be still strong within her heart, the long-harbored doubt concerning my strength of purpose.
With that I had to be content.
It would be folly for me to deny that I had a strange tremor in the region of my heart when I took an outer garment from her hands and folded it about her.
She looked up in one of her old coquettish ways that stirred the sluggish depths in my heart, and then coldly thanked me as she might her maid.
I knew too well how useless it would be for me to make glowing promises; another might hear me with satisfaction, but this woman believed she knew me too well to dream there was the least drop of heroic blood in my veins.
Well, my appearance on the scene in answer to her appeal for help must have been the first blow at this barrier.
Please Heaven, there might yet be others.