He made a curious gesture, as if he faced at last the inevitable. When he
answered her his voice was very low. He seemed to speak against his will.
"I--loved you."
"Ah!" It was scarcely more than a breath uttering the words. "And you
never told me!"
He was silent.
She raised herself at last and faced him. Her hands were on his
shoulders. "Percival," she said, and there was a strange light shining
in the eyes that he had dried. "Is your love so small, then--as to be
not--worth--mentioning?"
For the first time in her memory he avoided her look. "No," he said.
"What then?" Her voice was suddenly very soft and infinitely appealing.
He opened his arms with a gesture of renunciation "It is--beyond words,"
he said.
She leaned nearer. Her hands slipped upwards, clasping his neck.
"It is the greatest thing that has ever come to me," she said, and in her
voice there throbbed a new note which he had never heard in it before.
"Do you think--oh, do you think--I would cast--that--away?"
He did not speak in answer. It seemed as if he could not. That which lay
between them was indeed beyond words. Only in the silence he took her
again into his arms and kissed her on the lips.
* * * * *
By Ethel M. Dell
The Way of an Eagle
The Knave of Diamonds
The Rocks of Valpre
The Swindler
The Keeper of the Door
Bars of Iron
The Hundredth Chance
The Safety Curtain
Greatheart
The Lamp in the Desert
The Tidal Wave
The Top of the World
Rosa Mundi and Other Stories
The Obstacle Race
The Odds and Other Stories
Charles Rex
Tetherstones
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Odds, by Ethel M.
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