As he took it and gripped it firmly he looked at her and seemed about to speak. But instead he leaned down over her hand and pressed a kiss upon it, and swinging his horse away from her, rode off.
Valerie could not have told whether it was a town or a forest she rode on through, for she saw nothing of it. A fierce excitement burned through her, making her a little sick with the stress of it.
When she reached her room she threw up her window at the bottom, drew her chair to it, and sat down. Her thoughts swirled about in her mind for some time, and out of the swirl emerged a few well-defined certainties. She had wanted Dane to kiss her. She was falling in love with him. She wanted to fall in love with him. She wanted him to love her. But he drank. Perhaps he took morphia. He was a strange and difficult person. She did not understand him. And then the question, What was she going to do about it? And the questions, Did he care for her? If not, could she make him care? What was it that halted him every now and then?
She had not found any answer when at last she fell asleep.
