Then and then only did she see him as he really was, with that wistful tenderness in his deep-set eyes, that occasional flash of passion from beneath the lazily-drooping lids.

For a few minutes--seconds, mayhap--the spirit of the reckless adventurer was laid to rest, relegated into the furthermost background of this senses by the powerful emotions of the lover.
Then he would seize her in his arms, and hold her to him, with a strange longing to tear from out his heart all other thoughts, feelings and passions save those which made him a slave to her beauty and her smiles.
"Percy!" she whispered to him to-night when freeing herself from his embrace she looked up at him, and for this one heavenly second felt him all her own.

"Percy, you will do nothing rash, nothing foolhardy to-night.

That man had planned all that took place yesterday.

He hates you, and ..." In a moment his face and attitude had changed, the heavy lids drooped over the eyes, the rigidity of the mouth relaxed, and that quaint, half-shy, half-inane smile played around the firm lips.
"Of course he does, m'dear," he said in his usual affected, drawly tones, "of course he does, but that is so demmed amusing.