Greatheart by Ethel May Dell (best books to read for beginners TXT) 📕

eyes. "All right—Daphne," he murmured. "I'll have the first."

Dinah's heart gave a little throb of apprehension, but she quieted it impatiently. What had she to fear? She nodded and lightly turned away.

All through dinner she alternately dreaded and longed for the moment of his coming to claim that dance from her. That haughty confidence of his had struck a curious chord in her soul, and the suspense was almost unbearable.

She noticed that Rose was very serene and smiling, and she regarded her complacency with growing resentment. Rose could dance as often as she liked with him, and no one would find fault. Rose had had him all to herself throughout the afternoon moreover. She knew very well that had the ski-ing lesson been offered to her, she would not have been allowed to avail herself of it.

A wicked little spirit awoke within her. Why should she always be kept thus in the background? Surely her right to the joys of life was as great as—if not greater than—Rose's! With her it would all end so soon, while Rose had the whole of her youth before her like a pleasant garden in which she might wander or rest at will.

Dinah began to feel feverish. It seemed so imperative that she should miss nothing good during this brief, brief time of happiness vouchsafed her by the gods.

Her frame of mind when she entered the ballroom was curious. Mutiny and doubt, longing and dread, warred strangely together. But the moment he came to her, the moment she felt his arm about her, rapture came and drove out all beside. She drank again of the wine of the gods, drank deeply, giving herself up to it without reservation, too eager to catch every drop thereof to trouble as to what might follow.

He caught her mood. Possibly it was but the complement of his own. Freely he interpreted it, feeling her body throb in swift accord to every motion, aware of the almost passionate surrender of her whole being to the delight of that one magic dance. She was reckless, and he was determined. If this were to be all, he would take his fill at once, and she should have hers. Before the dance was more than half through, he guided her out of the labyrinth into the darkly curtained recess that led out to the verandah, and there holding her, before she so much as realized that they had ceased to dance, he gathered her suddenly and fiercely to him and covered her startled, quivering face with kisses.

She made no outcry, attempted no resistance. He had been too sudden for that. His mastery was too absolute. Holding her fast in the gloom, he took what he would, till with a little sob her arms clasped his neck and she clung to him, giving herself wholly up to him.

But when his hold relaxed at last, she hid her face panting against his breast. He smoothed the dark hair with a possessive touch, laughing softly at her agitation.

"Did you think you could get away from me, you brown elf?" he whispered.

"I—I could if I tried," she whispered back.

His hold tightened again. "Try!" he said.

She shook her head without lifting it. "No," she murmured, with a shy laugh. "I don't want to. Shan't we go back—and dance—before—before—" She broke off in confusion.

"Before what?" he said.

She made a motion to turn her face upwards, but, finding his still close, buried it a little deeper. "I—promised the Colonel—I'd be good," she faltered into his shoulder. "I think I ought to begin—soon; don't you?"

"Is that why I am to have only this one dance?" he asked.

"Yes," she admitted.

His caressing hand found and lightly pressed her cheek. "What are you going to do when it's over?" he asked.

"I don't know," she said. "There's Billy. I may dance with him."

He laughed. "That's an exciting programme. Shall I tell you what I should do—if I were in your place?"

"What?" said Dinah.

Again she raised her face a few inches and again, catching a glimpse of the compelling blue eyes, plunged it deeply into his coat.

He laughed again softly, with a hint of mockery. "I should have one dance with Billy, and one with the omnipotent Colonel. And then I should be tired and say good night."

"But I shan't be a bit tired," protested Dinah, faintly indignant.

"Of course not," laughed Sir Eustace. "You will be just ripe for a little fun. There's quite a cosy sitting-out place at the end of our corridor. I should go to bed viâ that route."

"Oh!" said Dinah, with a gasp.

She lifted her head in astonishment, and met the eyes that so thrilled her. "But—but that would be wrong!" she said.

"I've done naughtier things than that, my virtuous sprite," he said.

But Dinah did not laugh. Very suddenly quite unbidden there flashed across her the memory of Scott's look the night before and her own overwhelming confusion beneath it. What would her friend Mr. Greatheart say to such a proposal? What would he say could he see her now? The hot blood rushed to her face at the bare thought. She drew herself away from him. Her rapture was gone; she was burningly ashamed. The Colonel's majestic displeasure was as nothing in comparison with Scott's wordless disapproval.

"Oh, I couldn't do that," she said. "I—couldn't. I ought not to be here with you now."

"My fault," he said easily. "I brought you here before you knew where you were. If you go to confession, you can mention that as an extenuating circumstance."

"Oh, don't!" said Dinah, inexplicably stung by his manner. "It—it isn't nice of you to talk like that."

He put out his hand and touched her arm lightly, persuasively. "Then you are angry with me?" he said.

Her resentment melted. She threw him a fleeting smile. "No—no! But how could you imagine I could tell anyone? You didn't seriously—you couldn't!"

"There isn't much to tell, is there?" he said, his fingers closing gently over the soft roundness of her arm. "And you don't like that plan of mine?"

"I didn't say I didn't like it," said Dinah, her eyes lowered.
"But—but—I can't do it, that's all. I'm going now. Good-bye!"

She turned to go, but his fingers still held. He drew a step nearer.

"Daphne, remember—you are not to run away!"

A transient dimple showed at the corner of Dinah's mouth. "You must let me go then," she said.

"And if I do—how will you reward me?" His voice was very deep; the tones of it sent a sharp quiver through her. She felt unspeakably small and helpless.

She made a little gesture of appeal. "Please—please let me go! You know you are much stronger than I am."

He drew nearer, his face bent so low that his lips touched her shoulder as she stood turned from him. "You don't know your strength yet," he said. "But you soon will. Are you going away from me like this? Don't you think you're rather hard on me?"

It was a point of view that had not occurred to Dinah. Her warm heart had a sudden twinge of self-reproach. She turned swiftly to him.

"I didn't mean to be horrid. Please don't think that of me! I know I often am. But not to you—never to you!"

"Never?" he said.

His face was close to her, and it wore a faint smile in which she detected none of the arrogance of the conqueror. She put up a shy, impulsive hand and touched his cheek.

"Of course not—Apollo!" she whispered.

He caught the hand and kissed it. She trembled as she felt the drawing of his lips.

"I—I must really go now," she told him hastily.

He stood up to his full height, and again she quivered as she realized how magnificent a man he was.

"A bientôt, Daphne!" he said, and let her go.

She slipped away from his presence with the feeling of being caught in the meshes of a great net from which she could never hope to escape. She had drunk to-night yet deeper of the wine of the gods, and she knew beyond all doubting that she would return for more.

The memory of his kisses thrilled her all through the night. When she dreamed she was back again in his arms.

CHAPTER XVII THE UNKNOWN FORCE

"Arrah thin, Miss Isabel darlint, and can't ye rest at all?"

Old Biddy stooped over her charge, her parchment face a mass of wrinkles. Isabel was lying in bed, but raised upon one elbow in the attitude of one about to rise. She looked at the old woman with a queer, ironical smile in her tragic eyes.

"I am going up the mountain," she said. "It is moonlight, and I know the way. I can rest when I get to the top."

"Ah, be aisy, darlint!" urged the old woman. "It's much more likely he'll come to ye if ye lie quiet."

"No, he will not come to me." There was unalterable conviction in Isabel's voice. "It is I who must go to him. If I had waited on the mountain I should never have missed him. He is waiting for me there now."

She flung off the bedclothes and rose, a gaunt, white figure from which all the gracious lines of womanhood had long since departed. Her silvery hair hung in two great plaits from her shoulders, wonderful hair that shone in the shaded lamplight with a lustre that seemed luminous.

"Will I have to fetch Master Scott to ye?" said Biddy, eyeing her wistfully. "He's very tired, poor young man. There's two nights he's had no sleep at all. Won't ye try and rest aisy for his sake, Miss Isabel darlint? Ye can go up the mountain in the morning, and maybe that little Miss Bathurst will like to go with ye. Do wait till the morning now!" she wheedled, laying a wiry old hand upon her. "It's no Christian hour at all for going about now."

"Let me go!" said Isabel.

Biddy's black eyes pleaded with a desperate earnestness. "If ye'd only listen to reason, Miss Isabel!" she said.

"How can I listen," Isabel answered, "when I can hear his voice in my heart calling, calling, calling! Oh, let me go, Biddy! You don't understand, or you couldn't seek to hold me back from him."

"Mavourneen!" Biddy's eyes were full of tears; the hand she had laid upon
Isabel's arm trembled. "It isn't meself that's holding ye back. It's God.
He'll join the two of ye together in His own good time, but ye can't
hurry Him. Ye've got to bide His time."

"I can't!" Isabel said. "I can't! You're all conspiring against me. I know—I know! Give me my cloak, and I will go."

Biddy heaved a great sigh, the tears were running down her cheeks, but her face was quite resolute. "I'll have to call Master Scott after all," she said.

"No! No! I don't want Scott. I don't want anyone. I only want to be up the mountain in time for the dawn. Oh, why are you all such fools? Why can't you understand?" There was growing exasperation in Isabel's voice.

Biddy's hand fell from her, and she turned to cross the room.

Scott slept in the next room to them, and a portable electric bell which they adjusted every night communicated therewith. Biddy moved slowly to press the switch, but ere she reached it Isabel's voice stayed her.

"Biddy, don't call Master Scott!"

Biddy paused, looking back with eyes of faithful devotion.

"Ah, Miss Isabel darlint, will ye rest aisy then? I dursn't give ye the quieting stuff without Master Scott says so."

"I don't want anything," Isabel said. "I only want my liberty. Why are you all in league against me to keep me in just one place? Ah, listen to that noise! How wild those people are! It is the same every night—every night. Can they really be as happy as they sound?"

A distant hubbub had arisen in the main corridor, the banging of doors and laughter of careless voices. It was some time after one o'clock, and the merry-markers were on their way to bed.

"Never mind them!" said Biddy. "They're just a set of noisy children. Lie down again, Miss Isabel! They'll soon settle, and then p'raps ye'll get to sleep. It's not this way they'll be coming anyway."

"Someone is coming this way," said Isabel, listening with sudden close attention.

She