ndsomer. "Say the word. Only
say the word. Next Sunday at the quarry..."

She gathered the reins into her hand preliminary to starting.

"Good night," she said, "and--"

"Yes," he whispered, with just the faintest touch of impressiveness.

"Yes," she said, her voice low but distinct.

At the same moment she put the mare into a canter and went down the
road without a backward glance, intent on an analysis of her own
feelings. With her mind made up to say no--and to the last instant she
had been so resolved--her lips nevertheless had said yes. Or at least
it seemed the lips. She had not intended to consent. Then why had
she? Her first surprise and bewilderment at so wholly unpremeditated
an act gave way to consternation as she considered its consequences.
She knew that Burning Daylight was not a man to be trifled with, that
under his simplicity and boyishness he was essentially a dominant male
creature, and that she had pledged herself to a future of inevitable
stress and storm. And again she demanded of herself why she had said
yes at the very moment when it had been farthest from her intention.

CHAPTER XV

Life at the office went on much the way it had always gone. Never, by
word or look, did they acknowledge that the situation was in any wise
different from what it had always been. Each Sunday saw the
arrangement made for the following Sunday's ride; nor was this ever
referred to in the office. Daylight was fastidiously chivalrous on
this point. He did not want to lose her from the office. The sight of
her at her work was to him an undiminishing joy. Nor did he abuse this
by lingering over dictation or by devising extra work that would detain
her longer before his eyes. But over and beyond such sheer selfishness
of conduct was his love of fair play. He scorned to utilize the
accidental advantages of the situation. Somewhere within him was a
higher appeasement of love than mere possession. He wanted to be loved
for himself, with a fair field for both sides.

On the other hand, had he been the most artful of schemers he could not
have pursued a wiser policy. Bird-like in her love of individual
freedom, the last woman in the world to be bullied in her affections,
she keenly appreciated the niceness of his attitude. She did this
consciously, but deeper than all consciousness, and intangible as
gossamer, were the effects of this. All unrealizable, save for some
supreme moment, did the web