them. And I have made my own ceremonies—I say things to myself, and I try to live by them. On Sunday night, before I went to sleep, I had my ceremony for you ———”
She found herself being swung over into his arms, and her lips stilled by his.
“I’m sorry I was angry, Valerie dear.”
“You weren’t angry. You were hurt, and I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
“I’m sure you didn’t.”
He sat still for some time, his hold of her tense, but he kept his face away from her, raised as if he were keeping a fixed gaze upon a star that twinkled feebly above the valley horizon. Presently he looked down at her.
“What do you intend to do with me, Valerie?”
“Do with you?”
“That is what I asked.”
She raised herself and he released her without pressure.
“Why, Dane, can’t we go on loving one another?”
“I hope so. I don’t know.”
“You don’t know? Then, Dane, you are thinking of something—of something besides just us.”
“We are not on a desert island, child.”
She became belligerent at once. “Dane, I will not have my father or my family or anybody dictate to me what I shall do or how I shall live. I will not have you think of them. And besides, do they have to know? Aren’t we equal to keeping this to ourselves? I shall not tell a soul, not a single one. I’m fond of several women, but I would not trust one of them to keep a love secret. We can manage here perfectly well. Nobody at Mac’s knows what I do or where I go. I never began by telling them. Nobody there will ever spy on me.”
“How long had you thought of staying in Dargaville?”
“Why—I—when I came I thought of two years.”
