“I feel as you do,” said Ruth. “I would never consent to be your wife, if I could really divide you. I love you both too well for that.”
“Do you love me?” he asked, entirely forgetting his representative part.
Again the reproachful look, which faded away as she met his eyes. She fell upon his breast, and gave him kisses which were answered with equal tenderness. Suddenly he covered his face with his hands, and burst into a passion of tears.
“Jonathan! Oh Jonathan!” she cried, weeping with alarm and sympathetic pain.
It was long before he could speak; but at last, turning away his head, he faltered, “I am David!”
There was a long silence.
When he looked up she was sitting with her hands rigidly clasped in her lap: her face was very pale.
“There it is, Ruth,” he said; “we are one heart and one soul. Could he love, and not I? You cannot decide between us, for one is the other. If I had known you first, Jonathan would be now in my place. What follows, then?”
“No marriage,” she whispered.
“No!” he answered; “we brothers must learn to be two men instead of one. You will partly take my place with Jonathan; I must live with half my life, unless I can find, somewhere in the world, your other half.”