“We won't think of that,” she said hastily. “So many things may happen between then and now.”
Roderick rose, rested his hand on the back of her chair, and bent over her.
“One thing might happen that would fill the months with glory, and inaugurate our project in the radiance of the rising sun. Yet not for the scheme's sake, but for our lives' sake—for the sake of the expansion and development of all that is yearning within us to find utterance—Ella—Will you come with me?”
She sat, looking straight before her, her lips apart, her body slightly swaying. Words would not come. She vaguely wished that something could happen to rid her of his presence, that he could disappear, there and then, once for all, out of her life. Yet she felt it impossible to dismiss him. Some mysterious feminine chord had been struck whose echoes proclaimed his right to stand over her and speak to her thus.
“What are you saying?” she murmured, with an almost piteous emphasis on the last word.
“I am telling you that I love you, Ella, that my life is bound up in you, that I need you for the accomplishment of my manhood. And I am asking you to come with me to this sweet new land, to be my helper and my star. Say that you will come with me.”
“Give me time,” she breathed. “I can't say—I have been living in a whirl so long. I don't know what I am or think or feel. I will give you an answer some day—soon—not now.”
“I will wait devotedly for your answer,” said Roderick, in his courtliest manner, and moved a pace or two from her chair.
Ella looked up at him, almost grateful for his assurance.
“We will fix no period,” she said. “To have to give such a reply by a definite date—”