Charley of course declared that he still hoped that she would recover.
'If I thought so,' said she, 'I should not say what I am now saying; but I feel that I may tell the truth. Dear Charley, dearest Charley, I love you with all my heart—I do not know how it came so; I believe I have always loved you since I first knew you; I used to think it was because you saved my life; but I know it was not that. I was so glad it was you that came to me in the water, and not Harry; so that I know I loved you before that.'
'Dear Katie, you have not loved me, or thought of me, more than I have loved and thought of you.'
'Ah, Charley,' she said, smiling in her sad sweet way—'I don't think you know how a girl can love; you have so many things to think of, so much to amuse you up in London; you don't know what it is to think of one person for days and days, and nights and nights together. That is the way I have thought of you, I don't think there can be any harm,' she continued, 'in loving a person as I have loved you. Indeed, how could I help it? I did not love you on purpose. But I think I should be wrong to die without telling you. When I am dead, Charley, will you think of this, and try—try to give up your bad ways? When I tell you that I love you so dearly, and ask you on my deathbed, I think you will do this.'
Charley went down on his knees, and bowing his head before her and before his God, he made the promise. He made it, and we may so far anticipate the approaching end of our story as to declare that the promise he then made was faithfully kept.
'Katie, Katie, my own Katie, my own, own, own Katie—oh, Katie, you must not die, you must not leave me! Oh, Katie, I have so dearly loved you! Oh, Katie, I do so dearly love you! If you knew all, if you could know all, you would believe me.'
At this moment Mrs. Woodward knocked at the door, and Charley rose from his knees. 'Not quite yet, mamma,' said Katie, as Mrs. Woodward opened the door. 'Not quite yet; in five minutes, mamma, you may come.' Mrs. Woodward, not knowing how to refuse, again went away.
'Charley, I never gave you anything but once, and you returned it to me, did you not?'
'Yes,' said he, 'the purse—I put it in your box, because——'
And then he remembered that he could not say why he had returned it without breaking in a manner that confidence which Mrs. Woodward had put in him.