"You know," she said quietly. "I told you when you asked me to be your wife that--that there was--someone--for whom I cared. But, if you believed _all_ I told you then--you know, too, that you have no reason to be jealous."
"You mean because you can't marry him?"--moodily.
The brief reply acted like a spark to tinder. With a stifled exclamation he caught her up in his arms, crushing his mouth down on hers till her lips felt bruised beneath his kisses.
"It's not enough!" he said, his voice hoarse and shaken. "It's not enough! I want you--the whole of you, Nan--Nan!"
For an instant she struggled against him--almost instinctively. Then, remembering she had given him the right to kiss her if he chose, she yielded, surrendering passively to the fierce tide of his passion.
She kissed him obediently. But there was no warmth in her kiss, no answering thrill, and the man knew it. He held her away from him, his sudden passion chilled.
"Is that the best you can do?" he demanded, looking down at her with something grimly ironic in his eyes. She steadied herself to meet his glance.
"It is--really, Roger," she replied earnestly. "Oh!"--flushing swiftly--"you must know it!"
"Yes"--with a shrug. "I suppose I ought to have known it. I'm only a second string, after all."
There was so much bitterness in his voice that Nan's heart was touched to a compassionate understanding.
"Ah! Don't speak like that!" she cried tremulously. "You know I'm giving you all I can, Roger. I've been quite fair with you--quite honest. I told you I had no love to give you, that I could never care for anyone again,--like that. And you said you would be content," she added with reproach.
"I know I did," he answered sullenly. "But I'm not. No man who loved you would be content! . . . And I'm never sure of you. . . . You hate it here--"
"But it will be different when we are married," she said gently. Surely it _would_ be different when they were alone together in their own home without the perpetual irritation of Isobel's malicious little thrusts and Lady Gertrude's implacability?
"My God, yes! It'll he different then. I shall have you to _myself_!"
"Your mother?" she questioned, a thought timidly.
"She--and Isobel--will go to the dower house. No"--reading her thoughts--"they won't like it. They don't want to go. That's natural enough. Once I thought--" He checked himself abruptly, wondering how he could ever have conceived it possible that his mother might remain on at the Hall after his marriage. "But not now! I'll have my wife to myself"--savagely. "Nan, how long am I to wait?"