And then he drew a long breath.
"Oh, Frances, do you think I do not love you better than that? Could I wear you out for my selfish gratification and pleasure? It is like you to offer yourself for such a task, but I would not be a man, if I were to say yes."
Miss Lorraine's fair face was flushed. For a moment she struggled for self-control, and then she burst into tears.
"Oh, Philip, my heart would break, if you suffered and slowly died—away—out of my reach. I ask to come as your nurse. You cannot, you shall not, prevent me! Because I made a great mistake years ago, shall that mistake still shadow our lives? I am not a girl now, I am a woman, and if I am forward and unconventional, we are too old friends to misunderstand each other. You do not like hired nurses, I do not, and I plead with you now, for the sake of the girl you once loved, to give me the right to come with you and comfort you, and be with you till the end. Do not refuse me."
Colonel Douglas took her hands in his.
"Frances, my love has never changed, I have never swerved in my allegiance to you, and if you are going to crown my last days with such unspeakable happiness, I will hold out no longer."
He drew her to him, and the long lonely years of severed lives in the past, and the certainty of the black cloud hovering over them, so soon to sever them again, could not bring one drop of bitterness into that sweet moment when their hearts met and touched each other.
"We will not wait any longer," he said at last, "and we shall be married as quietly and quickly as possible."
Miss Lorraine acquiesced. Her one desire was to be with him now, and spare him as much as possible. She knew that joy and grief would be intermingled through every bit of intercourse they held together, but her own feelings she thought little about—he was her chief concern.
When Jean was told, she marvelled at Miss Lorraine's composure.