Page:Barbour--Joan of the ilsand.djvu/289

Rh "Do you really think you did, Keith?" she asked dreamily.

"Why, yes! Didn't I, Joan? You don't mean that you knew all the time—"

Joan smiled, dared a glance at him and nodded.

"Not quite all the time: not just at first: but after a little, yes. You—" she laughed faintly—"you were rather clumsy—dear!"

Swiftly his arms went about her then, and he kissed her lips, her smooth cheeks and the starlit eyes, and murmured her name.

"Joan! My Joan!" he said tenderly. "I've loved you so long, dear, and have wanted you so much. When—when will you marry me, Joan? Need we wait very long, dear?"

For answer she placed a slender hand behind his head and drew it down until his lips rested again on hers. After a moment:

"Do you know, dear," she whispered, "what makes me almost as happy as anything is that your secret has gone. I have always believed you would tell me some day. Of course I did not know what it was; I have always known that the cloud was there though. It is hard for a man to hide sorrow from the girl who loves him. At first I thought sometimes that it was—was somebody else in your life, and then—then I didn't think so. For your sake I was often very unhappy. Sooner or later you would have told me everything."