"I should think not," Honor says softly.
"Oh, it was very stupid of me!" he answers, with a grim smile. "But there's not much harm done, and I shall go by the next train."
"But"—with a swift hot blush—"you have not done what you came to do!"
He looks at her angrily. He sees nothing but mockery in her face, and his heart is sore, for all his pride resents it.
"Of course not! Why should I ask another man's betrothed to marry me?"
"But I am not another man's betrothed," the girl says, with a little sob. She is acting in a very unlady-like manner; but this is not the time to stand on etiquette; a little false pride now, and this man whom she loves with all her heart would slip out of her life never to return. She trembles and turns pale at the mere thought. "And I do think, if you came all the way from England to ask me that, you should ask me," she stammers, and turns rosy red again.
"Good heavens, Honor, are you making a fool of me?"
She does not speak; all her sweet audacity has fled before the passion in his eyes, in his voice, in his touch as he clasps her hand.
But, looking into her face, he needs no words to tell him that at last he has won the desire of his heart. He knows now what he has gained in winning her love, and how empty the years would have been without it. She is the one "good gift" that can crown his life, this beautiful willful woman whom once, in his ignorance, he called ONLY AN IRISH GIRL.