Barbara straightened herself as she watched the light vehicle disappear around a turn in the road.
She was thinking with a vague terror that so he would have tortured and driven her, cruelly, with no hope of escape. She was not prepared to see him return almost immediately at the same furious speed, and still less for his words as he pulled up his foaming horse.
“Get in,” he ordered her roughly. “I must speak to you.”
She looked up at him, her gray eyes sparkling defiance from under their long curling lashes.
“Will not?” he repeated. “But I say you shall listen to me.”
She walked on quietly. He stared after her with a muttered oath, as if half-minded to go on. Then he leaped down, jerked his horse roughly to the fence-rail, tied him fast, and strode after the slim figure in the shabby black gown.
He overtook her in a few long strides. She turned to face him in the middle of the muddy road.
“I told you I would leave you to yourself. I meant to. I intended to let you be frightened, harassed, driven to the wall; but I can’t,” he said in a low, choked voice. “I—love you! I love you! Do you hear me?”
She shrank back trembling before the man’s white face and blazing eyes.
“I never knew before what it was like to—to love,” he stammered. “But I do now. What did you mean by saying that you would not—sell yourself for a worn-out farm? Sell yourself—to me? Why, girl, I’d give you all that I have—and my soul to the devil for—— I’ll do anything you say, if you’ll only marry me! I’ll give you a dozen farms. I’ll——”
“Stop!” cried Barbara, her face slowly whitening. “I—I am sorry I said that. I didn’t mean——”
“Do you mean that you’ll marry me, Barbara—Barbara!”
“Listen,” he went on. “I’ve put in ten such days and nights as I never expected to spend in this or any other world.”
“You—must love me,” he stormed. “I—I can’t give you up!”
His shaken voice dropped into a low, pleading tone.
“You’ll not believe it, Barbara. But I—didn’t know what it was like to love anyone. Why should I? I married for money—I’m not ashamed to tell you. But Barbara! Barbara!”
The words rang out in a stifled cry, as he read the fear—the aversion in hers.
She writhed out of his grasp, her breath coming and going in little gasps.