-night--"

"No! . . . No!" She shrank from him, her hands stretched out as though
to ward him off.

"You've said 'no' to me for the last six months," he said grimly.
"But--that's ended now."

Her eyes searched his face wildly, reading only a set determination in
it. Slowly, desperately, she backed away from him; then, suddenly, she
made a little rush, and, reaching the door, pulled at the handle. But it
remained fast shut.

"_It's locked_!" she cried, frantically tugging at it. She flashed round
upon him. "The key! Where's the key?"

The words came sobbingly.

He put his fingers in his pocket.

"Here," he answered coolly.

Despairingly she retreated from the door. There was an expression in his
eyes that terrified her--a furnace heat of passion barely held in check.
The Englishman within him was in abeyance; the hot, foreign blood was
leaping in his veins.

"Max!" she faltered appealingly.

He crossed swiftly to her side, gripping her soft, bare arms in a hold so
fierce that his fingers scored them with red weals.

"By God, Diana! What do you think I'm made of?" he burst out violently.
"For months you've shut yourself away from me and I've borne it,
waiting--waiting always for you to come back to me. Do you think it's
been easy?" His limbs were shaking, and his eyes burned into hers. "And
now--now you tell me that you've done with me. . . You take everything
from me! My love is to count for nothing!"

"You never loved me!" she protested, with low, breathless vehemence.
"It--it could never have been love."

For a moment he was silent, staring at her.

Then he laughed.

"Very well. Call it desire, passion--what you will!" he exclaimed
brutally. "But--you married me, you know!"

She cowered away from him, looking to right and left like a trapped
animal seeking to escape, but he held her ruthlessly, forcing her to face
him.

All at once, her nerve gave way, and she began to cry--helpless,
despairing weeping that rocked the slight form in his grasp. As she
stood thus, the soft silk of her wrapper falling in straight folds about
her; her loosened hair shadowing her white face, she looked pathetically
small and young, and Errington suddenly relinquished his hold of her and
stepped back, his hands slowly clenching in the effort not to take her in
his arms.

Something tugged at his heart, pulling against the desire that ran riot
in his veins--something of the infinite tenderness of love