He was too passionately in love himself at that moment to be chilled by this response. It was more than he had ever looked for, that sweet surrender of herself. Protestations of love would sound strangely from Monica’s lips. He hardly even wished to hear them. She must feel some tenderness towards him. She had given herself to him to love and cherish; surely his great love could accomplish the rest. He drew her gently towards him. She did not resist; she let herself be encircled by his protecting arm. “I will try to make you very happy,” he said, with a sort of manly simplicity [141]that meant more than the most ardent protestations could have done. “May I kiss you, Monica?” [141] She lifted her down-bent face a little, and he pressed a kiss upon her brow. She made no attempt to return the caress, but he did not expect it. It was enough that she permitted him to worship her. “You have made me very happy, Monica,” he said presently, whilst the shadows deepened round them. “Will you not let me hear you say that you are happy too?” She looked at him at last. He could not read the meaning of that gaze. “I want to make you happy, my darling,” said Randolph, very softly. Again that strange, earnest gaze. “Make my father and Arthur happy,” [142]she said, sweetly and steadily, “and I shall be happy too.” [142] He did not understand the full drift of those words, as he might perhaps have done had he been calmer—did not realise as at another moment he might have done their deep significance. He was desperately, passionately in love, carried away inwardly, if not outwardly, by the tumult of his feelings. He did not realise—it was hardly likely that he should—that to secure her father’s happiness and the future well-being and happiness of her brother Monica had promised to be his wife. She respected him, she liked him, she was resolved to make him a true and faithful wife; and she knew so little of the true nature of wedded love that it never occurred to her to think of the injury she might be doing
Prev.
Back
Top