Page:Held to Answer (1916).pdf/196

 face of his dream. In it was everything which he had hoped to find there. Marien Dounay had made woman mean more to him than woman had ever meant before. But here in the upturned, trusting face of Bessie, with its sparkle in the eyes and its sunny witchery in the dimples, there was something infinitely richer and more satisfying than experience or imagination had been able to suggest.

Here, he told himself reverently, was every blessing that God had compounded for the happiness of man. And it was his,—modestly, trustfully his. Every detail of her expression and her beauty, every subtly playing current of her personality, made him know it. He had but to declare himself and reach out and take her like a lover.

But, strangely, he could do neither. An awe was on him. He felt like falling down upon his knees and thanking God, but not like taking her; not like touching her even, though he could not resist that when Bessie extended frankly both her hands, quite in the old manner of cordial, happy comradeship. John took them in his, and as she returned his touch with the warm frank clasp that was characteristic of her hearty nature, he got anew the sense of the woman in her. It swept over him like an intoxication that was rare and wonderful, like no rapture he had ever known before—half-spiritual but half wholly human—therefore with something in it that frightened him.

"Bessie," he asked, abruptly, "could we get away from here quickly—in a very few minutes—away from men and houses and things?"

Bessie looked surprised. "Of course; we're going out, aren't we?"

"But quickly," urged John, "just a mad impulse, just a romantic impulse; the feeling that I want to get you out