“Does she look adown her apron!” floated the words through his brain.  Ah!  Here at last was the Gila he had been seeking!  The Gila who would understand!

“Tell me, Gila!” he said, in an eager, low appeal.

She stirred softly, drooped a little more toward him, her face turned away till only the charming profile showed against the rich darkness of a crimson curtain.  Now at last he was coming to it!

“It was—­you—­I meant!” she breathed softly.

He sat up sharply.  There was subtle flattery in her tone.  He could not fail to be stirred by it.

“Me!” he said, almost sternly.  “I don’t understand!” but his voice was gentle, almost tender.  She looked so small and scared and “Solveig"-like.

“You meant me!” he said, again.  “Won’t you please explain?”

CHAPTER XXI

Courtland went back to college that night in a tender and exalted mood.  He thought he was in love with Gila!

That had been a wonderful little scene before the fire, with the soft, hidden yellow lights above, and Gila with her delicate, fervid little face, great, dark eyes, and shy looks.  Gila had risked a tear upon her pearly cheek and another to hang upon her long lashes, and he had had a curious desire to kiss them away; but something held him from it.  Instead, he took his clean handkerchief, softly wiping them, and thought that Gila was shy and modest when she shrank from his touch.

He did not take her in his arms.  Something held him from that, too.  He had a feeling that she was too sacred, and he must not lightly snatch her for himself.  Instead, he put her gently in the big chair by his side, and they sat and talked together quietly.  He did not realize that he had done the most of the talking.  He did not know what they had talked about; only that reluctant whispered confession of hers had somehow entered him into a close intimacy with her that pleased and half awed him.  But when he tried to tell her of a wonderful experience he had had she lifted up her little hand and begged:  “Please, not to-night!  Let us not think of anything but just each other to-night!” And so he had let it pass, knowing she was all wrought up.

He had not asked her to marry him, nor even told her he loved her.  They had talked in quiet, wondering ways of feeling drawn to each other; at least he had talked, and Gila had sat watching him with deep, dissatisfied eyes.  She had sense enough to see that she could not win him with the arts that had won others.  His was a nature deeper, stronger.  She must bide her time and be coy.  But her spirit chafed beneath delay, and dark passions lurked behind and brooded in her eyes.  Perhaps it was this that held him in a sort of uncertainty.  It was as if he waited permission from some unseen source to take what she was so evidently ready to give.  He thought it was the sacredness in which he held her.  Almost the sermon and the feeling of the Presence were out of mind as he went home.  There played around him now a little phantom joy that hovered over like a will-o’-the-wisp above his heart, and danced, giving him a strange, inexplicable exhilaration.  Was this love?  Was he in love?