AC dBooks

. . 'Somebody will,' said he. 'Make your mind easy
about that. Somebody will,' he said, and then he went on walking to and
fro."
Price told this story as if she thought she was bringing me the gladdest
of glad tidings; but the idea that Martin had come back into my life to
master me, to take possession of me, to claim me as his own (just as he
did when I was a child) and thereby compel me to do what I had promised
his mother and Father Dan not to do--this was terrifying.
But there was a secret joy in it too, and every woman will know what I
mean if I say that my heart was beating high with the fierce delight of
belonging to somebody when I returned to the boudoir where Martin was
waiting to sit down to dinner.
Then came a great surprise.
Martin was standing with his back to the fire-place, and I saw in a
moment that the few hours which had intervened had changed him as much
as they had changed me.
"Helloa! Better, aren't we?" he cried, but he was now cold, almost
distant, and even his hearty voice seemed to have sunk to a kind of
nervous treble.


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