CHAPTER XVII
A SPRIG OF HELIOTROPE
The light of a pale young moon filtered in through the chinks of the blind
and crept towards the bed where Ann lay tremulously awake, overwhelmed by
the sudden revelation--which had come to her--the revelation of her love
for Eliot Coventry.
Too unselfconscious to be much given to introspection, she had never asked
herself whither the last few months had been leading her. But now, an hour
ago, the touch of Eliot's lips against her hand and the sudden, passionate
demand in his voice had torn aside the veil and shown her her own heart.
With a shy, almost childlike sense of wonder, she realised that her love
for him was not a thing of new or sudden growth. It had been slumbering
deep within her, unrecognised and unacknowledged, ever since that moment
when their eyes had first met across the Kursaal terrace at Montricheux.
Like a little closed bud it had lain curled in her heart, to open wide when
the sun kissed its petals.
And that Eliot loved her in return she had now no doubt. In that brief,
poignant moment of understanding, as they stood together in the warm
starlit dusk, he had revealed it. She could still feel his lips crushed
suddenly against her palm, and hear his shaken voice: "Ann, do you think I
shall find the way?"
The way to the garden of happy hours! They would find it together.
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