Penny Blood Serial Fiction — page 132: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE APPOINTMENT 115 then he fastened his lips to hers, inhaling all the fragrance of her breath. By degrees he became bolder; and Octavia, awakening as it were from her dream otf bias, struggled to extricate herself from his embrace; but he wound his arms around her, he strained her to his breast, he murmured impassioned words and vows and protestations in her ear, and with kisses he stifled the remonstrances and the beseechings that rose to her lips. But suddenly a strong sense of danger flashed in unto her mind, ay, and therewith a feeling that all this was wrong — very wrong; so that whatsoever virtuous principle was innate in her woman’s nature asserted its empire that very instant. The immediate consequence was that, re- covering all her presence of mind, and casting off in a moment the voluptuous languor that had come over her, Octavia tore herself from his embrace, exclaiming, “ Oh, George! is this your love for me? Would you plunge me into the depths of shame and degradation? ” “ Beautiful being!” cried Harley, seizing her hands and pressing them one after the other to his lips, “ wherefore do you reproach me? Should not I rather ask you where is that love which you have suffered me to believe that your soul cherishes for me? Oh, give me a love that knows nothing save its own inclinations, that can obey no dictates save those of the heart which contains it, and that absorbs in its own intensity all worldly considerations, all social conventions, and all the cold repugnance of a miserable prudery! Give me such a love as this, my Octavia,” ex- claimed Harley, his countenance becoming absolutely splendid as he made this impassioned appeal to the maiden’s feelings, — “ give me such a love as this, my angel, and I will deserve it by a life devoted to you, by an existence surrendered altogether to the delightful duty of ensuring your happiness, and by the homage, the adoration, and the worship of my heart! ”’ And as he uttered these last words, he dropped her - hands and extended his arms toward her. “ Oh, George! what would you have me do?” she mur- mured, ane herself upon his breast and raising her countenance to = oan the fervid kisses which he imprinted upon her cheeks. (E() GoOmilcbdoo ‘S