A moment later they were in darkness, though now and again a vivid flash of lightning illuminated the harbour through sheets of blinding, torrential rain.
He strode back to the little couch, and sank down again by her; but he resisted the aching longing to take her once more into his arms. Instead he took her soft hand in his, while he muttered in a broken voice, “I’ve been a brute! You must forgive me.”
She answered in a stifled voice, “There is nothing to forgive.”
“I’ve been to blame all through!”
Then, in a tone he strove to lighten, “I ought to have labelled you ‘dangerous’ from the first moment I saw you.”
She melted into tears, and remorsefully he whispered, “Have I hurt you by saying that?”
She shook her head; but she pulled her hand away.
“Listen, Ivy?”
It was the first time Miles Rushworth had called her by her name, and for that, Jervis, poor fool, had thought him old-fashioned and over-formal.
“Yes,” she whispered submissively.
“We’ve got to talk this out—you and I.”
“Yes,” she said again, wondering what he meant by those strange words, and longing, consciously, even exultantly, longing, for him to take her again in his strong arms.
“I’ll begin by telling you something I’ve never told to any living being.”
He uttered those words in so serious a tone that Ivy felt a thrill of fear, of doubt, go through her. Had he a woman in his life whom he would not, or could not, give up?
“I was twenty when my father died, and before his death we had a long private talk. Quite at the end of our talk, he made me give him a solemn promise.”
Rushworth stopped a moment. He was remembering what had been the most moving passage up to now in his thirty-five years of life. It was as if he heard the very tones of his father’s firm, if feeble, voice.
“At the time my promise seemed easy to keep. Indeed, I was surprised he thought it necessary to exact it.”
“What was your promise?” Ivy whispered, and she came a little, only a little, nearer to him.
“My promise was never to allow myself to fall in love with a married woman. Though it hasn’t always been as easy as I thought it would be, till now I have kept that promise. But now I’ve broken it, for I love you. Love you? Why I adore you, my darling——”
Again he waited, and Ivy felt oppressed, bewildered. Many men had said that they adored her. But no man had made that delightful, exciting admission, without showing strong apparent emotion.
Rushworth had uttered the words calmly, collectedly, and staring straight before him.
“And I can’t help myself—that’s the rub,” he went on, in the same matter-of-fact voice. “Indeed, I’m afraid I’m going to go on loving you all my life,” he smiled a rueful smile in the soft darkness which encompassed them.
“But of course I knew, even then, when I was a cub of twenty, what my father really meant. There is a part of my promise to him I can keep; and what’s more—by God, I intend to keep it!”
She was moved, thrown off her usual calculating balance, by the strength of his sincerity, and also made afraid.
“What d’you mean?” she faltered.
“It’s true that I love you—I didn’t know there could be such love in the world as that which I feel for you, Ivy. If it would do you any good for me to jump into that harbour out there and be drowned, I’d do it! But I’m going to keep my love for you sacred, and I’m going not only to save myself, but I’m going to save you, my darling, darling love.”
He took her hand again, and this time he kissed it.
Ivy burst into bitter tears, and Rushworth put his arm around her.
“I know how you’re feeling,” he whispered brokenly. “My poor little darling! But for God’s sake don’t cry. I can’t bear it. You’ve nothing to be ashamed of—it’s been all my fault.”
“Can’t we go on being friends? It’s been so wonderful having you for a friend!” she sobbed.
“Of course we’ll go on being friends—dear, dear friends. But lovers—no! I’m going right away—it’s the only thing to do.”
He was telling himself that of course she did not understand—how could she, gentle and pure if yet passionate creature that she was?—the strength of his temptation. She would never know, indeed, he must never allow her to know, what she meant to him, and all he was about to give up for her sake. A sweet, loving wife, children, in a word, a happy, normal life—all that Bella Dale had stood for in the secret places of his heart.
He was brought back to the present by her agitated, agonised, “Going away? Surely you’re not going away, now?”
He waited a moment without answering her. A frightful struggle was going on in his heart, his conscience. Then, at last, he answered the, to him, piteous question.
“Do you remember my once telling you of my sister? Of how I longed for you to know her—but that she was too ill for me to take you to her.”
“Yes,” she murmured, trying to remember.
She had not been really interested, only secretly glad that Rushworth’s widowed sister was not well enough to see her. Ivy Lexton did not care to be brought in contact with her men friends’ mothers or sisters. They never liked her, and she never liked them.
“My sister saw a new specialist this week, and he says she ought to winter in South Africa. She’s horribly lonely—her husband was killed in the war, and—and now I’ve made up my mind to go with her. You do agree that it’s the best thing—indeed, the only thing for me to do?”
There was something in his tone as he uttered the question that made her feel that, for the moment, at any rate, no plea would move him.
“I hate your going so far away,” she moaned.
“It’s the only thing to do,” he repeated in a hard tone.
“I’m afraid you despise me,” she said very low.
“Despise you? Good God! I honour you——”
And then all at once she was again in his arms.
Moved out of her false selfish self by the strength and reality of his emotion, “I love you,” she murmured, clinging to him between their kisses. “I shall always love you,” and believed she spoke the truth.
Surely, surely, he wouldn’t go away now?
The door opened, and in the darkness they sprang apart.
“The hotel has sent the car for you, sir. It is now on the quay.”
“The car?”
A feeling of surprise and despondency swept over Ivy.
Rushworth got up. For a moment or two, it seemed like eternity to him, he found he could not speak.
Then he said, “I’m afraid I must go now, Mrs. Lexton. I’m sleeping at the Hotel Royal to-night. A business friend of mine is staying there, and we are going to have a talk before turning in. He is going to Paris tomorrow morning.”
Addressing his servant: “I’ll be coming in a minute. The storm’s over, isn’t it?” he added.
“I think it is, sir.”
“Then put on the light again, and take the despatch-box that’s over there on my writing-table to the car.”
Rushworth waited till the sounds