ow she
loved him, when she felt in him the passionate lover, the wild, untamed
creature that he was at heart, on whom the frigid courtliness of manner
sat but as a thin veneer. This was his own real personality, and there
was little now of the elegant and accomplished gentleman of fashion,
schooled to hold every emotion in check, to hide every thought, every
desire save that for amusement or for display.

She--feeling her power and his weakness now--gave herself wholly to his
embrace, not grudging one single, passionate caress, yielding her lips
to him, the while she murmured:

"You cannot go... you cannot... why should you go?... It is madness to
leave me... I cannot let you go..."

Her arms clung tenderly round him, her voice was warm and faintly shaken
with suppressed tears, and as he wildly murmured: "Don't! for pity's
sake!" she almost felt that her love would be triumphant.

"For pity's sake, I'll go on pleading, Percy!" she whispered. "Oh! my
love, my dear! do not leave me!... we have scarce had time to savour our
happiness.. we have such arrears of joy to make up.... Do not go,
Percy... there's so much I want to say to you.... Nay! you shall not!
you shall not!" she added with sudden vehemence. "Look me straight in
the eyes, my dear, and tell me if you can leave now?"

He did not reply, but, almost roughly, he placed his hand over her
tear-dimmed eyes, which were turned up to his, in an agony of tender
appeal. Thus he blindfolded her with that wild caress. She should
not see--no, not even she!--that for the space of a few seconds stern
manhood was well-nigh vanquished by the magic of her love.

All that was most human in him, all that was weak in this strong and
untamed nature, cried aloud for peace and luxury and idleness: for long
summer afternoons spent in lazy content, for the companionship of horses
and dogs and of flowers, with no thought or cares save those for the
next evening's gavotte, no graver occupation save that of sitting at HER
feet.

And during these few seconds, whilst his hand lay across her eyes, the
lazy, idle fop of fashionable London was fighting a hand-to-hand fight
with the bold leader of a band of adventurers: and his own passionate
love for his wife ranged itself with fervent intensity on the side of
his weaker self. Forgotten were the horrors of the guillotine, the
calls of the innocent, the appeal of the helpless; forgotten the daring
adventures, the excitements, the hair's-b