Then she hesitated and paused.
“Please go on,” the young man said gently.
“It is only,” she answered, with a pathos which a woman would have understood, “that I did not want to be married at all. I had never thought of it as being a thing I needed to be troubled about.”
Keith Burgess smiled faintly at her frankness, which was not cruel of intention, he knew, but his smile touched Anna’s heart.
“I did not wish to trouble you,” he said quietly.
“Please do not misunderstand me. It was not the way to express it—my words sounded unkind, I am afraid. I should learn better ways of gentler speaking. Other women seem to have them naturally.”
“I like it that you are honest, even if it hurts,” said Keith, steadily.
“I did not mean that you trouble me—not exactly. Only that my life looked so plain and clear to me, and this is so surprising—it seems to change things so.”
“Only by a little outward difference. I should not dare to ask you to go as my wife if I did not believe that you could work more effectively so, perhaps,” he added timidly, “even more happily, if I had strength and protection to give you, and a home of some sort, however poor, in that strange land.”
Something in the quality of his voice brought swift tears to Anna’s eyes. It was so new to have some one thinking and caring for her ease and happiness. It had so long been her part to do this for others, to forget herself, and take it quite for granted that others should forget her.