"Is it a promise, Chris?" he asked at length.
She threw him a nervous glance and nodded.
He laid his hand upon hers and held it still. "Chris, have you any debts now?"
"My dear," he said, "don't be afraid of me!"
There was that in his voice that moved her to the depths; she could not have said why. Impulsively, almost passionately, she went into his arms.
"I won't!" she said. "I won't! Trevor, I--I've been a little beast! That money you gave me on my birthday I didn't do--what you meant me to do with it. I just--spent it. I don't know how. And then--when you asked about it that night--I didn't dare to tell you, and I haven't dared since. I just let you think it was all right--when it wasn't. Oh, Trevor, don't be angry--don't be angry!"
"Not really? But how you must despise me! It's just the way of the Wyndhams. We all do it. Trevor, why did you make me tell you?"
"My dear child," he said, "you must tell me these things. It is your only possibility of happiness, and mine also. Chris, never keep anything from me, for Heaven's sake! Don't you know that I trust you?"
"I don't deserve it!" sobbed Chris, clinging faster. "You don't know how bad I am!"
"Hush!" he said, with a restraining hand upon her head. "You have told me everything now?"
"Oh no, I haven't!" she whispered. "There are crowds of things I couldn't even begin to tell you. I have always warned you how it would be. I always said--"
Her agitation was increasing, and her words became inaudible. He saw that her nerves had given way under the long day's strain, and firmly, with infinite gentleness, he put a stop to further discussion of a subject that threatened to upset her seriously.
"Never mind," he said. "You will tell me by and bye, or if you don't I shall know it is all right. Chris, Chris, you mustn't get hysterical. You are worn out, dear, and it has upset your sense of proportion. Come, I am going to send you to bed. We will go into these money matters in the morning."
But Chris vehemently negatived this. "I don't want to--to spoil to-morrow. I--I shouldn't sleep for thinking of it. Oh, Trevor, let's settle it now. I'm going to be sensible--really. And--and--if you'll forgive me for all the bad things I've done up to to-day I--I will really try to tell you everything as it happens from now on. Will you, Trevor?"