Page:Tongues of Flame (1924).pdf/416

 upon the paralyzed person of Henry Harrington. Her lips tremblingly framed a word but her spirit could not utter it.

"Billie!" her lover exclaimed, and leaped for her. "Billie!" In one hoarse inarticulate cry, all the anguish, all the bitterness of his sore heart emptied itself, and he swept her rapturously into his arms; yet not to cover her tremulous lips with kisses. The moment, the event, was too sacred to him even for the interchange of that most sacred of tokens between lovers. Instead he gathered her closely in his arms and, as making sure that she was there, pressed her soft cheek upon his, head bowed over her shoulder in acknowledgment to God of this inestimable gift while between his lids, closed in a transport of happiness, there streamed grateful tears. So he held her! She had come! She was there! He already knew enough to make sure that misunderstandings would be explained. Love would justify itself to love.

"The key is on the inside of the door, Henry!" shouted a far-away voice, and the rapt man broke out of his delirium long enough to note that White had somehow vanished and that the door was closed. He reached out and gave the key precautionary attention; yet with his first motion became aware that Billie began gently to put hersclf away from him.

"But you—you did love me—didn't you dear? . . . You did believe in me every minute?" he began to importune, clinging as if he would refuse to lose her.

"Yes, oh, yes, Henry! Of course I loved you!" she sighed with painful intensity. "Of course I believed in you; but—" the blue eyes, lifting themselves now to his, were shame-charged—"but—I failed you!"