"May I kiss you for the last time, Crystal?"
"No, Maurice," she replied, "never again."
"You are still free," he urged. "You are not plighted to de Marmont yet."
"No—not actually—not till to-night. . . ."
"Then . . . mayn't I?"
"No, Maurice," she said decisively.
"Your hand then?"
"If you like." He knelt down close to her; she yielded her hand to him and he with his usual impulsiveness covered it with kisses into which he tried to infuse the fervour of a last farewell.
Then without another word he rose to his feet and walked away with a long and firm stride down the avenue. Crystal watched his retreating figure until the overhanging branches of the ilex hid him from her view.
She made no attempt now to restrain her tears, they flowed uninterruptedly down her cheeks and dropped hot and searing upon her hands. With Maurice's figure disappearing down the dark avenue, with the echo of his footsteps dying away in the distance, the last chapter of her first book of romance seemed to be closing with relentless finality.