“Forgive me—oh, forgive me!” she cried. “How I have wronged you!”
Stuart clasped her hand with his own, then dropped upon his knees at her feet, and pressed his lips to her fingers.
“Forgive you!” he said, passionately. “It is from you forgiveness must come, my sweet, my love! I shall kneel at your feet till you have pardoned me, Margery, my darling!”
“Oh, hush!” she whispered. “Forgive you? Yes, a hundred times! Indeed, it is all forgotten now, forgotten and done with.”
“Forgotten!” cried Stuart. “Ah, no!”
“We were brave in words on that day, Stuart,” said Margery, gazing at the fire. “How little we guessed that the battle would begin that very moment, the fight be so long! We were so happy, and now——”
“And now,” he said, hoarsely, rising to his feet, “life is ended forever! You are not free. I find you and lose you forever at the same time. What have we done that fate should be so hard, so cruel!”
Margery felt the gladness, the triumphant joy, die out of her heart, her senses grow numb and heavy; she came back from the happy past to the present; she remembered all.
“Stuart,” she said, slowly and impressively, “it is too late to speak of that; we must part now, never to meet again.”
“Never to meet again!” he repeated, raising his head from his hands. “Oh, no, no—that is too much! Let me see you, hear you speak. If you are taken from me now, the darkness will be too terrible. Ah, Margery, have some pity! Think of our love, our dream; do not send me from you.” He seized her hands in his, and half drew her into his arms; but, as his eyes fell on her pale, troubled face, he loosed his hold, and, standing upright before her, said, rapidly: “Yes, I will go—I will go to the uttermost parts of the earth—to death—if only you will tell me that you love me, have ever loved me, and me only!”