This page needs to be proofread.
354
THE BOND

a lulling, sensuous power, a mighty influence, a will. It dissolved all things into dream. One seemed to feel the world swinging through space, wild, primeval, obedient only to a single law which crushed the individual will to dust. Danger! Danger to one's small individuality, to one's little world, opposing this vast, impersonal, indifferent force!

The blood came to Teresa's face. At the touch of Crayven's lips on her hand she did not move, but the sound of his voice—he murmured her name—sent her to her feet with a leap.

"Come away from here!" she cried, pale and laughing a little. "This place is bewitched! Come at once, or you will turn into something queer! I felt myself turning into a tree as I sat there—a birch-tree, all white and—and taking root by that rock!"

"Ah, why couldn't you let the dream come true," he said, his black eyes glowing.

"No, no—no dreams! I'm afraid of them. One does such odd things in dreams—and if they should come true! And this place! … Why, here one could murder one's grandmother, or do anything odd, and it would seem perfectly natural—only I daresay the Swiss police would find it out!"

She laughed again restlessly, and her eyes, blue as the sky, glanced about the place. Crayyen got up and came close to her.