He thought that Gilda was very tense and after a moment he asked beguilingly,
“Will you not trust me?”
There was a pause before Gilda answered,
“I – want to do so – but I am – afraid.”
“Of me?”
“Of what you – might think.”
There was a faint smile on the Marquis’s lips, which Gilda did not see as he asked,
“Does it matter to you what I think?”
“Of – course it – matters.”
“Why?”
The question was sharp and Gilda felt that it was almost like an arrow piercing into the very depths of her being.
Now she was trembling again, but it was different from the way she had trembled before.
Unexpectedly the Marquis put his hand under her chin and turned her face up to his.
He looked down at her cheeks wet with tears, her lips quivering and her blue eyes too shy to meet his.
It was impossibl
