Page:The Other House (London, William Heinemann, 1896), Volume 1.djvu/105

Rh rigid and passive. Dennis sank into a chair with his vain hands upon his knees. "What do you mean by my coming in spite of you? You never asked me not to—you've treated me well till now. It was my idea—yes; but you perfectly accepted it." He gave her time to assent to this or to deny it, but she took none, and he continued: "Don't you understand the one feeling that has possessed me and sustained me? Don't you understand that I've thought of nothing else every hour of my way? I arrived here with a longing for you that words can't utter; and now I see—though I couldn't immediately be sure—that I found you from the first constrained and unnatural."

Rose, as he went on, had raised her eyes again; they seemed to follow his words in sombre submission. "Yes, you must have found me strange enough."

"And don't again say it's your being anxious !" Dennis sprang up warningly. "It's your being anxious that just makes my right."

His companion shook her head slowly and ambiguously. "I am glad you've come."

"To have the pleasure of not receiving me?"