When she spoke again her voice shook a little.

"You are wrong," she said, "quite wrong. I should pick up the flower
and"--steadily--"I should keep it, because it was thrown to me by a man
who had twice done me the greatest service in his power."

Once again he checked, as if by sheer force of will, a sudden eager
movement towards her.

"Would you?" he said quickly. "Would you do that? But you would be
mistaken; I should be gaining your kindness under false pretences. The
greatest service in my power would be for me to go away and never see you
again. . . . And, I can't do that--now," he added, his voice vibrating
oddly.

His eyes held her, and at the sound of that sudden note of passion in his
tone she felt some new, indefinable emotion stir within her that was half
pain, half pleasure. Her eyelids closed, and she stretched out her hands
a little gropingly, almost as if she were trying to ward away something
that threatened her.

There was appeal in the gesture--a pathetic, half-childish appeal, as
though the shy, virginal youth of her sensed the distant tumult of
awakening passion and would fain delay its coming.

She was just a frank, whole-hearted girl, knowing nothing of love and its
strange, inevitable claim, but deep within her spoke that instinct,
premonition--call it what you will--which seems in some mysterious way to
warn every woman when the great miracle of love is drawing near. It is
as though Love's shadow fell across her heart and she were afraid to turn