"That closes that door then"; and I endeavoured to make her feel that I refused to take things too seriously.
There was a slight pause during which she glanced at me twice nervously and said hesitatingly: "There is another way if you will take it."
"Not the last resource, yet. It has not come to that by a long way."
"No. I--I mean--you ought to think of Bessie. I wish that. You must."
"Do you mean she should go away? I am afraid she would not care to go. I wish she would."
"But you--you might take her."
"Althea!" The Christian name slipped from me unwittingly in my quick protest against the suggestion that I should desert her. I stopped in confusion, and the colour rushed to her face. We were both embarrassed by the blunder.
Presently she raised her eyes to mine. "Please do it. I wish it," she urged in a low, intensely earnest tone.
"Do you believe it possible?"
"If you care at all for what I say or wish, you will do it."