"One kiss," he said softly, and then turned them to meet hers.
Christine gave him the kiss, and it was as he had said. The stress upon her heart was loosened. She felt that she had told him all.
"You are mine," he said, in a calm, low voice of controlled exultation, although, even as he said it, he loosed her from his arms and suffered her to move away from him and sink into a chair. He came and sat down opposite her, repeating the words he had spoken.
"No," she said, "I am my own! I am the stronger to be so, now that the whole truth is known to you. Mr. Noel, I have only to tell you good-by. To-night must be the very last of it."
"Mr. Noel!" he threw the words back to her, with a little scornful laugh. "You can never call me that again, without feeling it the hollowest pretence! I tell you you are mine!"
The assured, determined calm of his tones and looks began to frighten her. She saw the struggle before her assuming proportions that made her fear for herself--not for the strength of her resolve, but for her power to carry it out. She could only repeat, as if to fortify herself:
"Because--ah, because I love you too much. Be merciful, and let that thought plead for me."
"It is for the same reason that I will never give you up. It is no use to oppose me now, Christine. You are mine and I am yours."
"But if you know that you make me suffer--"
"I know, too, that I can comfort you. I know I can make you happy, beyond your highest dreams. I know I can take you away from every association of sadness, far off to beautiful foreign countries where no one will know us for anything but what we are--what alone we shall be henceforth, a man and woman who love each other and who have been united in the holy bond of marriage, which God has blessed--just a husband and wife, Christine--get used to the dear names and thought--with whose right to love each other no one will have anything to do. If the idea of the past disturbs you we will get rid of it by going where we have no past, where no one will ever have heard of us before. As for ourselves, Christine, I can give you my honor that there is nothing in the past of either of us that disturbs me for one pulse-beat, and I'll engage to make you forget all that it pains you to remember. Why, it is a simple thing to do. We send for a clergyman, and here in this room, with Mrs. Murray and Eliza and Harriet for witnesses, we are married to-morrow morning! In the afternoon we sail for Europe, to begin our long life of happiness together. You know whether I could make you happy or not, Christine. You know whether your heart longs to go with me--just as surely as I know that my one possible chance of happiness is in getting your consent to be my wife."