"Oh, oh!" she gasped, overwhelmed by his daring passion. "I should die
if anyone saw you here." Yet she spasmodically extended the umbrella so
that it covered him and left her out in the drizzle.
"And so should I," responded he softly. "Listen to me. For hours and
hours I have been longing for the dear old hills in which you found
me. I wanted to crawl out of Edelweiss and lose myself forever in the
rocks and crags. To-night when you saw me I was trying to say good-bye
to you forever. I was trying to make up my mind to desert. I could not
endure the new order of things. You had cast me off. My friends out
there were eager to have me with them. In the city everyone is ready to
call me a spy--even you, I thought. Life was black and drear. Now, my
princess, it is as bright as heaven itself."
"You must not talk like this," she whispered helplessly. "You are making
me sorry I called to you."
"I should have heard you if you had only whispered, my rain princess. I
have no right to talk of love--I am a vagabond; but I have a heart, and
it is a bold one. Perhaps I dream that I am here beside you--so near
that I can touch your face--but it is the sweetest of dreams. But for it
I should have left Edelweiss weeks ago. I shall never awaken from this
dream; you cannot rob me of the joys of dreaming."
Under the spell of his passion she drew nearer to him as he clung
strongly to the rail. The roses at her throat came so close that he
could bury his face in them. Her hand touched his cheek, and he kissed
its palm again and again, his wet lips stinging her blood to the tips of
her toes.
"Go away, please," she implored faintly. "Don't you see that you must
not stay here--now?"
"A rose, my princess,--one rose to kiss all through the long night," he
whispered. She could feel his eyes burning into her heart. With
trembling, hurried fingers she tore loose a rose. He could not seize it
with his hands because of the position he held, and she laughed
tantalizingly. Then she kissed it first and pressed it against his
mouth. His lips and teeth closed over the stem and the rose was his.
"There are thorns," she whispered, ever so softly.
"They are the riches of the poor," he murmured with difficulty, but she
understood.