"Christina! Why should they think such a thing?"
"Why shouldn't they? Don't you?"
She put her finger on his lips to still his cry of protest, and, looking down into his face, her own eyes slowly filled with that brooding of maternal tenderness which seemed to search him through and through. For a moment he thought that her eyes brimmed, that her lips trembled with some communication. But, without speaking, she ran her hand along his arm and a quiver passed through her; taking his face in her two hands she bent and kissed his mouth. In that kiss they plighted a deeper troth than in ten thousand promises. And, creeping close into his breast with a shuddering sigh, she pressed her cheek to his. "Oh, Bryce, you won't let them take me away? I can stand anything but being locked up—I couldn't bear that—I couldn't! What can I do?"
"My dearest, no one in the world can harm you!"
"I came here to be safe, where I could touch you. Let me rest here a little, and feel your heart close to me. Oh, my love, I'm so frightened! I thought I was strong! I thought I was brave and could go through with it! But I can't! I'm tired—to death! All through my soul, I'm cold. It's only here I can get warm!"
"Christina," he asked her, "go through with what?"
She stirred in his arms and drew back. "Look first—ah, carefully!—from the window. What do you see?"
"Nothing but ordinary people passing. And the usual number of waiting taxis."
"Well, in the nearest of those taxis is a detective. He has been following me all the afternoon. He is sitting there waiting for me to come out."
Herrick carried her hand to his lips. "Christina, don't think me a cursed schoolmaster. But it's imagination, dear. You've driven yourself wild with all this worry and excitement. Why, believe me, they're not so clumsy! If they were following you, you wouldn't know it."