'Oh, don't!' hurriedly broke in Wilmet, standing still in consternation.
'Nay,' he said in a pleading voice, 'I know it would be presumption to think so short an acquaintance could suffice, but you see I have so little time, and all I want is leave to use it in coming to see you.'
'Oh, don't!' she repeated. 'Indeed you had better not. It would be only pain. I couldn't! and I can't have Felix worried;' and there was a startled sob in her voice; but he answered with the strength and sweetness that had upheld her in Lance's most suffering moments.
'I would not distress you or Felix for more than words can utter! I would not have breathed a hint of this most earnest wish of my heart till you had had some preparation, if it were not so impossible otherwise to have any chance of being with you and striving—'
'Please,' entreated Wilmet, 'that is just what should be avoided; it can never come to anything, and the sooner it is stopped the better.'
'Why should it never come to anything?' he asked, encouraged by detecting tears in her voice.
'Because you know—no, you don't know, or you never could think of such a thing—how wrong and impossible it would be for me!'
'No, I don't know. That is what I want to have the opportunity of knowing.'
'I can tell you before,' she answered, faintly. 'Oh, if you would but take my word for it, it would save so much—'
'No, that I cannot do,' he repeated. 'I must see for myself your preciousness at home.'