ept down--for,
startled as she was at Gerry's unexpected words, she did not lose her
presence of mind.

"What is it, Gerry darling? What is it, dear love? Has anything
happened? I'll come."

"Yes--come into my room. Come away from our girl. She mustn't hear."

She knew then at once that his past had come upon him somehow. She
knew it at once from the tone of his voice, but she could make no
guess as to the manner of it. She knew, too, that that heartquake was
upon her--the one she had felt so glad to stave off that day upon the
beach--and that self-command had to be found in an emergency she might
not have the strength to meet.

For the shock, coming as it did upon her false confidence--a sudden
thunderbolt from a cloudless sky--was an overwhelming one. She knew
she would have a moment's outward calm before her powers gave way, and
she must use it for Sally's security. What Gerry said was true--their
girl _must not_ hear.

But oh, how quick thought travels! By the time Rosalind, after
stopping a second outside Sally's door, listening for any movement,
had closed that of her husband's room as she followed him in, placing
the light she carried on a chair as she entered, she had found in the
words "our girl" a foretaste of water in the desert that might be
before her.

Another moment and she knew she was safe, so far as Gerry himself
went. As he had himself said, he would be the same Gerry to her and
she the same Rosey to him, whatever wild beast should leap out of the
past to molest them. She knew it was as he caught her to his heart,
crushing her almost painfully in the great strength that went beyond
his own control as he shook and trembled like an aspen-leaf under the
force of an emotion she could only, as yet, guess at the nature of.
But the guess was not a wrong one, in so far as it said that each was
there to be the other's shield and guard against ill, past, present,
and to come--a refuge-haven to fly to from every tempest fate might
have in store. She could not speak--could not have found utterance
even had words come to her. She could only rest passive in his arms,
inert and dumb, feeling in the short gasps that caught his breath
how he struggled for speech and failed, then strove again. At last
his voice came--short, spasmodic sentences breaking or broken by like
spans of silence:

"Oh, my darling, my darling, remember!... remember!... whatever it
is ... it shall not come between us ... it shall not ..