had foolishly thought to escape one evil, and you made me
realize that I was rushing into a worse. You saved me from myself. You
may have made me suffer then; but it was a healing hurt you dealt me.
And should I bear you an ill-will for that?"

He had risen from his knee. He stood apart, pondering her from under
bent brows with eyes that were full of angry fire.

"I do not think," she ended, "that there needs more between us. I
have understood you, sir, since that day at Maidstone--I think we were
strangers until then; and perhaps now you may begin to understand me.
Fare you well, my lord."

She made shift to go, but he barred her passage now in earnest, his
hands clenched beside him in witness of the violence he did himself to
keep them there. "Not yet," he said, in a deep, concentrated voice. "Not
yet. I did you a wrong, I know. And what you say--cruel as it is--is no
more than I deserve. But I desire to make amends. I love you, Hortensia,
and desire to make amends."

She smiled wistfully. "'Tis overlate to talk of that."

"Why?" he demanded fiercely, and caught her arms, holding her there
before him. "Why is it overlate?"

"Suffer me to go," she commanded, rather than begged, and made to free
herself of his grasp.

"I want you to be my wife, Hortensia--my wedded wife."

She looked at him, and laughed; a cold laugh, disdainful, yet not
bitter. "You wanted that before, my lord; yet you neglected the
opportunity my folly gave you. I thank you--you, after God--for that
same neglect."

"Ah, do not say that!" he begged, a very suppliant again. "Do not say
that! Child, I love you. Do you understand?"

"Who could fail to understand, after the abundant proof you have
afforded me of your sincerity and your devotion?"

"Do you rally me?" he demanded, letting through a flash of the anger
that was mounting in him. "Am I so poor a thing that you whet your
little wit upon me?"

"My lord, you are paining me. What can you look to gain by this? Suffer
me to go."

A moment yet he stood, holding her wrists and looking down into her eyes
with a mixture of pleading and ferocity in his. Then he made a sound
in his throat, and caught her bodily to him; his arms, laced about her,
held her bound and crushed against him. His dark, flushed face hovered
above her own.

Fear took her at last. It mounted and grew to horror. "Let me go, my
lord," she besought him, her voice trembling. "Oh, let me go!"

"I love you, Hortensia! I