Page:The achievements of Luther Trant - Balmer and MacHarg - 1910.djvu/216

188 green stone is de cha'm dat is come to make yo' break Marse Richard's heart!"

"Ulame! Oh! Oh!" the girl cried.

"Ulame! Ulame!" a deeper, firm and controlled voice checked them both as the man, whose steps had sounded overhead the moment before, stood in the doorway.

He was a strikingly well-born, good-looking man of thirty-six, strongly set up, muscular, with the body of an athlete surmounted by the broad-browed head of a student. But his skin, indescribably bronzed by the tropic sun during many expeditions to Central America, showed now an underhue of sodden gray; and the thin, red veins which shot his keen, blue eyes, the tenseness of his well-shaped mouth, the pulse visibly beating in his temples, the slight trembling of the usually firm hands, all gave plain evidence of some active grief and long-continued strain; but at the same time bore witness to the self-control which held his emotion in check.

The negress, quieted and rebuked by his words, shuffled out as he entered; and the girl drew herself up quickly to a sitting posture, rearranging her hair with deft pats.

"You must not mind Ulame!" He crossed to her and held her hand steadyingly for an instant. "Or think that I shall ask you anything more except—you have not altered your decision, Iris?" he asked, gently.

The girl shook her head.

"Then I will not even ask that again, my—Iris," he caught himself. "If you will give me the proper