I glanced at the clock and saw it was later than I thought.
"Do you know what I have come for this morning, Lucia?" I asked,
leaning my elbow on the arm of her chair, and looking into the soft
blue eyes that seemed to have a sort of timidity in them of me now.
"To torment me as usual, I suppose," she answered.
"That depends upon how you take it," I said, with a slight laugh.
"I have come to say Good-bye."
I watched her keenly as I spoke, and I saw she was perceptibly
startled. She fixed her eyes upon me, and the colour began to recede
visibly from her face. However, she only said calmly after a
moment,--
"Well, if you are going away, I shall have peace at any rate."
"Yes, dear," I answered gently, "you will have peace certainly as
far as I am concerned, for if I go now I shall consider our
engagement terminated."
Lucia started into an upright position in her chair.
"Victor!" she exclaimed, fixing two widely-dilated eyes upon me,
"what are you talking about? What have I done? What do you mean? You
must not go!"
And her hand sought mine and closed over it with an appealing,
seducing touch. It went through my nerves and frame like flame. It
seemed to confuse and scatter speech, sweep it from me as some
useless trifle, and wake one intolerable burning desire for action.
I withdrew my hand suddenly, unbent my arm, and leaning over the
intervening chair side, put it round the low exquisite waist and
tried to draw her towards me.
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