Thorne was startled and perplexed. Opposition he was prepared for, argument he could meet and possibly refute, tears and reproaches he could subdue--but dumb, quiet resistance baffled him. Suddenly he abandoned reason, cast self-control to the winds, and gave the reins to feeling. If he could not convince her through the head, he would try a surer road--the heart. Though proof against argument, would she be proof against love? He knew she loved him; he felt it in every fiber of his being, every pulse of his heart--and he was determined to win her at all hazards; his she must be; his she _should_ be. "My love!" he murmured, extending his arms with an appealing tenderness of look and gesture. "Come to me. Lay your sweet face on my breast, your dear arms around my neck. I need you, Princess; my heart cries out for you, and will not be denied. I can not live without you. You are mine--mine alone, and I claim your love; claim your life. What is that woman? What is any woman to me, save you, my darling--you only? My love! My love! It is my very life for which I am pleading. Have you no pity? No love for the man whose heart is calling you to come?" Pocahontas shivered, and bent slightly forward--her face was white as death, her eyes strange and troubled. The strength and fire of his passion drew her toward him as a magnet draws steel. Was she yielding? Would she give way? Suddenly she started erect again, and drew back a step. All the emotions, prejudices, thoughts of her past life; all the principles, scruples, influences, amid which she had been reared, crowded back on her and asserted their power. She could _not_ do this thing. A chasm black as the grave, hopeless as death, yawned at her feet; a barrier as high as heaven erected itself before her. "I can not come," she wailed in anguish. "Have you no mercy?--no pity for me? There is a barrier between us that I dare not level; a chasm I can not cross." "There is _no_ barrier," responded Thorne, vehemently, "and I will acknowledge none. I am a free man; you are a free woman, and there is no law, human or divine, to keep us asunder, save the law of your own will. If there be a chasm--which I do not see; which I swear does not exist--_I_ will cross it. If you can not come to me, I can come to you; and I _will_. You are _mine_, and I will hold you--here in my arms, on my breast, in my heart. Have you, and hold you, so help me God!" With a quick stride he crossed the small space between them, and stood close, but still not touching her. "Have you no pity?" she moaned.