“I don’t know what you’d think about the danger,” she returned with seriousness, “but I simply hate the kind of things she told me.”

His frown returned with gathered energy.  “Is that so?  What were they?”

“Oh, I don’t know—­nothing definite—­but about women generally.”

“Women!  Pshaw!  You’re the only woman.  There isn’t any other on the earth.”

Her hand lay on the arm of her chair, and he reached out and grasped her wrist, not gently, but with a violent pressure.  “I’ll swear there isn’t another woman in existence,” he exclaimed.

An electric current started from his fingers through the length of her arm; she felt it burning into her flesh as it travelled quickly from her wrist to her heart.  For one breathless moment she was conscious of his presence as of a powerful physical force, and the sensation came to her that she was being lifted from her feet and swept blindly out into space.  Then, drawing slightly away, she released herself from his grasp.

“I give you fair warning that if you repeat that for the third time, I shall believe it,” she retorted coolly.

“I’m trying to make you,” he returned in a strained voice.  “Why are you such a sceptic, I wonder,” he added as he fell back into his chair.  “Can’t you tell the real thing when you come across it?”

“The real thing?” Her words were almost a whisper.

“Are you so used to shams that you don’t recognise a man’s love when you see it?”

She leaned toward him, her black brows drawn together with the sombre questioning look which had always fascinated him by its strangeness.  Beyond the look, what was there? he asked with an intense and eager curiosity.  What passionate surprises existed in her?  What secret suggestions of a still undiscovered charm?  The wonder of her temperament rose before him, exquisite, remote, alluring, and he felt the appeal she made thrill like the spirit of adventure through his blood.  Again he stretched out his hand, but with a frown he drew it back before it touched her.

“Can’t you see that I love you?” he said with an angry hoarseness.

His face, his voice, the gesture of his outstretched hand startled her into a quick feeling of terror, and she shrank back with a childlike movement of alarm.  Where was her dream, she demanded with an instinctive repulsion, if this was the only living reality of love?  Then his face changed abruptly beneath her look, and as the strong tenderness of his smile enveloped her, she was conscious of a sudden ecstasy of peace.

“Did I frighten you?” he asked, smiling.

She shook her head, resting her fingers for an instant upon his hand.  “I don’t believe you could frighten me if you tried,” she answered.

He raised his eyebrows with his characteristic blithe interrogation, “Well, I shouldn’t like to try, that’s all.”

“I give you leave—­my courage is my shield.”