Gerry reached out and caught hold of her arm. She swung around, her face quite white.
“I see,” she said in a low voice, “you want it now.”
“Why did you yell at me to jump into your horrible boat?”
“You took me for Nance,” repeated Alix with a mimicry and in a tone that left no doubt as to the fact that she was in a nasty temper. “And _why_,” she went on, her eyes blazing and her slight figure trembling, “did you strike me--slap me across the face?”
“Because I love you,” replied Gerry, steadily.
“Oh!” gasped Alix. Her slate-gray eyes went wide open in unfeigned amazement, and suddenly the tenseness that is the essence of attack went out of her body. Instead of a self-possessed and very angry young woman, she became her natural self--a girl fluttering before her first really thrilling situation.
There was something so childlike in her sudden transition that Gerry was moved out of himself. For once he was not slow. He caught hold of her and drew her toward him.
But Alix was not to be plucked like a ripe plum. She freed herself gently but firmly, and stood facing him. Then she smiled, and with the smile she gained the upper hand. Gerry suddenly became awkward and painfully aware of his bare arms and legs. He felt exceptionally naked.
“It,” said Alix. “When--how long have you loved me?”
Gerry’s face turned a deep red, but he raised his eyes steadily to hers. “It began,” he said simply, “when I took you in my arms and you laid your face against my shoulder and cried like--like a little kid.”
“Oh!” said Alix again, and blushed in her turn. She had lost the upper hand and knew it. Gerry’s arms went around her, and this time she raised her face and let him kiss her.
“‘CLEM,’ HE SAID, ‘DO YOU THINK I _WANT_ TO GO AWAY?’”]
“Now,” she said as they started for the camp, “I suppose I must call you Gerry.”
“Yes,” said Gerry, solemnly. “And I shall call you Little Miss Oh!”
So casual an engagement might easily have come to a casual end, but Gerry Lansing was quietly tenacious. Once moved, he stayed moved. No woman had ever stirred him before; he did not imagine that any other woman would stir him again.
To Alix, once the shock of finding herself engaged was passed, came full realization and a certain amount of level-headed calculation. She knew herself to be high-strung, nervous, and impulsive, a combination that led people to consider her lightly. On the day of the wreck Gerry had shown himself to be a man full grown. He had mastered her; she thought he could hold her.