was something about Saltash at the moment, something unfamiliar and
unfathomable that frightened her. His careless drollery, his two-edged
ironies, were nought to her; but his silence was a barrier unknown that
she could not pass. She could only cling voicelessly to the support he
had not denied her.

He brought her to the settee and stood still. His face was strangely
grim.

"Well--Toby?" he said.

She twisted in his hold and faced him, but she kept his arm wound close
about her, her hand tight gripped on his. "Are you--angry with me for
coming?" she asked him quiveringly. "I--had to come."

He looked down into her eyes. "_Bien, petite!_ Then you need--a friend,"
he said.

Her answering look was piteous. "I need--you," she said.

One of the old gay smiles flashed across his face. He seemed to challenge
her to lightness. The grimness went out of his eyes like a shadow.

"And so you have come, _ma mignonette_, at the dead of night--at the risk
of your reputation--and mine--"

Toby made an excruciating grimace, and broke impulsively in upon him. "It
wasn't the dead of night when I started. I've been waiting hours--hours.
But it doesn't matter. I've found you--at last. And you can't send me
away now--like you did before--because--because--well, I've no one to go
to. You might have done it if you'd come down earlier. But you can't do
it--now." Her voice thrilled on a high note of triumph. "You've got to
keep me--now. I've come--to stay."

"What?" said Saltash. He bent towards her, looking closely into her face.
"Got to keep you, have I? What's that mean? Has Bunny been a brute to
you? I could have sworn I'd made him understand."

She laughed in answer. "Bunny! I didn't wait to see him!"

"What?" Saltash said again.

She reached up a quick, nervous hand and laid it against his breast. Her
eyes, wide and steadfast, never flinched from his. "I've come--to stay,"
she repeated. And then, after a moment, "It's all right. I left a note
behind for Bunny. I told him I wasn't going back."

He caught her hand tightly into his. His hold was drawing her, and she
yielded herself to it still with that quivering laughter that was somehow
more eloquent than words, more piteous than tears.

Saltash spoke, below his breath. "What am I going to do with you?" he
said.

Her arms reached up to him suddenly. Perhaps it was that for which she
had waited. "You're going--to keep me--this time," she told him
tremulously. "Oh, why d