She closed her
eyes, and her head touched his shoulder, while the faint scent of her
hair and its soft caressing touch upon his cheek maddened him to a fury
of love.
"Say you are mine, Mysie! Say you are mine!" he cried, and his voice was
strange and hoarse and dry with the desire within him. He felt her body
yielding as it relaxed in his arms, as if in answer to some unspoken
demand, and in a moment he realized himself and started back, hot shame
surging over his face and conquering the passion in his blood. In that
strange mad moment he had felt capable of anything--powerful,
overmastering, relentless in his desires; and now--weak, shame-stricken
and helpless. Ere he could say anything, Mysie had come to herself with
a shock, and started away over the moor as if possessed by something
that was mysterious and terrible.
That had happened a year ago, and though Robert sought to learn when she
was in the village, and often watched her from a safe place where he was
not seen, delighting his eyes with the sight of her figure, and feeling
again the same hot shame come over him, as he had known that day on the
moor, yet he had never met her near enough to speak to her, but had
worshiped her at a distance and grown to love and desire her more and
more with every day that passed.
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