Mrs. Dean silently folded her knitting and rose to go into the house. At the door, however, she paused, and, looking back at her brother, said, in her low, even tones,—
"I have said my last word of this affair, David, no matter what comes of it. You think you understand Katherine better than I, but you may find some day that it's better to prevent trouble than to try to cure it."
Meanwhile, Darrell and Kate had reached their favorite seat beneath the pines and, after one or two futile attempts at talking, had lapsed into a constrained silence. To Kate there came a sudden realization that the merely friendly relations heretofore existing between them had been swept away; that henceforth she must either give the man at her side the concentrated affection of her whole being or, should he prove unworthy,—she glanced at his haggard face and could not complete the supposition even to herself. He was troubled, and her tender heart longed to comfort him, but his strange appearance held her back. At one word, one sign of love from him, she would have thrown herself upon his breast and begged to share his burden in true woman fashion; but he was so cold,
so distant; he did not even take her hand as in the careless, happy days before either of them thought of love.
Kate could endure the silence no longer, and ventured some timid word of loving sympathy.
Darrell turned, facing her, his dark eyes strangely hollow and sunken.
"Yes," he said, in a low voice, "God knows I have suffered since I saw you, but I deserve to suffer for having so far forgotten myself last night. That is not what is troubling me now; it is the thought of the sorrow and wretchedness I have brought into your pure, innocent life,—that you must suffer for my folly, my wrong-doing."
"But," interposed Kate, "I don't understand; what wrong have you done?"
"Kathie," he answered, brokenly, "it was all a mistake—a terrible mistake of mine! Can you forgive me? Can you forget? God grant you can!"
"Forgive! Forget!" she exclaimed, in bewildered tones; "a mistake?" her voice faltered and she paused, her face growing deathly pale.