Page:The Blind Man's Eyes (July 1916).pdf/265

Rh She heard his breath come fast.

"Nothing," he denied.

"No; you must tell me!" Her hand was still on his arm.

"I cannot."

"Why can you not?"

"Why?"

"Can't you trust me?"

"Trust you!" he cried. He turned to her and seized her hands. "You ask me to—trust you!"

"Yes; I've trusted you. Can't you believe as much in me?"

"Believe in you, Miss Santoine!" He crushed her fingers in his grasp. "Oh, my God, I wish I could!"

"You wish you could?" she echoed. The tone of it struck her like a blow, and she tore her hands away. "What do you mean by that?"

He made no reply but stood staring at her through the dark. "We must go back," he said queerly. "You're cold."

She did not answer but started back up the path to the house. He seemed to have caught himself together against some impulse that stirred him strongly. "The man out there who saw us? He will report to your father, Miss Santoine?" he asked unsteadily.

"Reports for Father are first made to me."

"I see." He did not ask her what she was going to do; if he was assuming that her permission to exceed his set limits bound her not to report to her father, she did not accept that assumption, though she would not report to the blind man to-night, for she knew he must now be asleep. But she felt that Eaton was no longer thinking of this. As they entered the house