Beyond the Rocks

Theodora had not spoken for a moment after his first speech. It made her

heart beat too fast.

"I have been watching you all through dinner," he continued, with only a

little pause. "You look immensely beautiful to-night, and those two told

you so, I suppose."

"Perhaps they did!" she said. This was her first gentle essay at

fencing. She would try to be as the rest were, gay and full of badinage.

"And you liked it?" with resentment.

"Of course I did; you see, I never have heard any of these nice things

much. Josiah has always been too ill to go out, and when I was a girl I

never saw any people who knew how to say them."

She had turned to look at him as she said this, and his eyes spoke a

number of things to her. They were passionate, and resentful, and

jealous, and full of something disturbing. Thrills ran through poor

Theodora.

His eyes had been capable of looking most of these things before to

other women, when he had not meant any of them, but she did not know

that.

"Well," he said, "they had better not return or recommence their

compliments, because I am not in the mood to be polite to them

to-night."

"What is your mood?" asked Theodora, and then felt a little frightened

at her own daring.

"My mood is one of unrest--I would like to be away alone with you, where

we could talk in peace," and he leaned over her so that his lips were

fairly close to her ear. "These people jar upon me. I would like to be

sitting in the garden at Amalfi, or in a gondola in Venice, and I want

to talk about all your beautiful thoughts. You are a new white flower

for me, as different as an angel from the other women in the world."

"Am I?" said she, in her tender tones. "I would wish that you should

always keep that good thought of me. We shall soon go our different

ways. Josiah has decided to leave next week, and we are not likely to

meet in England."

"Yes, we are likely to meet--I will arrange it," he said.

There was nothing hesitating about Hector Bracondale--his way with women

had always been masterful--and this quality, when mixed with a sudden

bending to their desires, was peculiarly attractive. To-night he was

drifting--drifting into a current which might carry him beyond his

control.