far in as you
can. Is it--oh, my dearest"--the sob of pure joy came again--"is it pity
that you see?"

She'd had her hands upon his shoulders, but now they clasped themselves
behind his head. Her vision of him had swum away in a blur, and without
the support she got from him she'd have been swaying giddily.

"Roddy, old man," she said, "if I hadn't seen--in the first--ten
minutes, the thing you--meant so hard I shouldn't see--I think it would
have--killed me. If I hadn't seen that you loved me--after all; after
everything. After all the tortures you'd suffered, through me. Because
that's all I want--in the world."

At that he put his arms around her and pulled her up to him. But the
manner of it was so different from his old embraces that presently she
drew him around so that what little light there was fell on his face,
and searched it thoughtfully.

"You _do_ believe me, Roddy, don't you--that there isn't any pity about
it? There isn't any room for pity. There's nothing in me at all but just
a great big--want of you. Don't you understand that?"

He did understand it with his mind, but he was a little dazed, like
one who has stood too near where the lightning struck. The hope
he had kept buried alive so long--buried alive because it wouldn't
die--could not be brought out into a blinding glory like this without
shrinking--pain--exquisite terrifying pain.

The knowledge she had acquired by her own suffering stood her in good
stead now. She did not mistake, as the Rose he had married might have
done, the weakness of his response for coldness--indifference.

She went back and began making love to him more gently; released herself
from his arms, led him over to her one big chair, and made him sit down
in it, settled herself upon the arm of it and contented herself with one
of his hands. Presently he took one of hers, bent his face down over it
and brushed the back of it with his lips.

The timidity of that caress, with all it revealed to her, was too much
for her. She swallowed one sob, and another, but the next one got away
from her and she broke out in a passionate fit of weeping.

That roused him from his daze a little, and he pulled her down in his
arms--held her tight--comforted her.

When she got herself in hand again, she got up, went away to wash her
face, and coming back in the room again, lighted a reading-lamp and drew
down the blinds.

"Rose," he said presently, "what are we going to do?"

She kne