“C. Q.”; or, In the Wireless House
she whispered, and took his other hand in her left.
And as she did so that strange, inexplicable something—that aura—animal magnetism—what you will—that had held Micky powerless suddenly dropped away and in its place there stole over him that physical revulsion he had felt in his dream for the Tove that had swarmed its tentacles over the side and dragged him down into the ocean's depths, and she too felt it depart—knew that the pure had revolted from the impure,—and that the oil and water of their natures had resolved themselves again into their own elements, and she drew him to her passionately in one last effort to overwhelm his spiritual instinct with her physical intoxication.
“Promise me!” she breathed as he struggled to draw away his hands. “Promise me—”
He wavered.
There was a stamp of feet outside, the door was thrown rudely open and a ship’s lantern held high in the hairy fist of a seaman illuminated the wireless house and disclosed Captain Ponsonby glaring at them white with anger.
250
