. Oh! I suppose you found me
very amusing--a missioner who thought it worth while to give a part of
his life to help his fellows climb a few steps higher up. What devil was
it that sent you stealing down the lane that night from your house, I
wonder?"

She nodded slowly.

"I'm sorry you can speak of it like that," she said. "To me it was the
most delightful piece of sentiment! Almost like a poem!"

"A poem! It was the Devil's own poetry you breathed into me! What a poor
mad fool I became! You saw how easily I gave my work up, how I sulked up
to London, fighting with it all the time, with this madness--this----"

"Dear me," she said, "what an Adam you are! My dear Victor, isn't
it--you are very, very young. There is no need for you to manufacture a
huge tragedy out of a woman's kiss."

"What else is it but a tragedy," he demanded, "the kiss that is a
lie--or worse? You brought me here, you let me hold you in my arms, you
filled my brain with mad thoughts, you drove everything good and worth
having out of life, you filled it with what? Yourself! And then--you pat
me on the cheek and tell me to come, and be kissed some other day, when
you feel in the humour, a wet afternoon, perhaps, or when you are
feeling bored, and want to hunt up a few new emotions! It may be the way
with you and your kind. I call it hellish!"

"Well," she said, "tell me exactly what it is that you want?"

"To be laughed at--as you did before?" he answered fiercely. "Never
mind. It was the truth. You have lain in my arms, you came willingly,
your lips have been mine! You belong to me!"

"To be quite explicit," she murmured, "you think I ought to marry you."

"Yes!" he declared firmly. "A kiss is a promise! You seem to want to
live as a 'poseuse,' to make playthings of your emotions and mine. I
wanted to build up my life firmly, to make it a stable and a useful
thing. You came and wrecked it, and you won't even help me to rebuild."

"Let us understand one another thoroughly," she said. "Your complaint
is, then, that I will not marry you?"

The word, the surprising, amazing word, left her lips again so calmly
that Macheson was staggered a little, confused by its marvellous
significance. He was thrown off his balance, and she smiled as a
wrestler who has tripped his adversary. Henceforth she expected to find
him easier to deal with.

"You know--that it is not that--altogether," he faltered.

"What is it that you want then?" she asked calmly