"But you couldn't! And she might grow to care."
He sat in a big chair by the window, stared moodily at the floor. "It seems to me I can't do that!" he said at last. "I don't love her as men usually love. She means infinitely more to me than that. And, loving her as I do, I'm in no danger of telling her. And it would make me almost happy so much of the time, and a better man—yes, a better man—to be near her. What you say I ought to do—it's like turning a man out into the desert without food or drink—to wander—on and on——"
"I know, I know," she interrupted, her small, sweet face all tenderness and distress. "Oh, I'm not competent to advise. You mustn't ask anyone. You must do what you think is right."
"Right!" he echoed forlornly.
She who had eaten of the husks that went by the name of right hadn't the heart to urge them on him. She returned to the table, to the arranging of the flowers. Without looking up he went on: "I haven't told you quite all. There's another thing. I—I'm engaged."
"Engaged!"
"Don't look at me that way. I can feel it, though I'm not seeing. You can't think less of me than I think of myself. But let me tell you. The girl's a distant cousin of mine. And her grandfather, who was crazy about families, left her a fortune on condition that she married me. He left an equal sum to me on condition that I marry her. But there's this difference: What he left her is all she'd have—every cent. I've got enough without his legacy to me."
"And you— Oh, it's dreadful, isn't it?"
"We're not in love—not in the least. But I've given her my promise, and she'd be penniless if I broke it. She's nineteen. We've got till she's twenty-one. She's abroad now."
"The letters I've seen in the mail—they're from her?"