"Then why cannot I be more to you? Why am I to be denied a chance of forwarding the cause in which all my hopes are centred? Monica, say you will meet me somewhere—soon."
"How can I?" she says, tremulously. Her voice is full of tears. She is altogether different from the coquettish, provoking child of last night. "You forget all I have just now said."
"At least tell me," says he, sadly, "that if you could you would."
There is a pathetic ring in his tone, and tears rise to her eyes. Can anything be so hopeless as this love-affair of hers?
"Yes, I would," she says, almost desperately.
"Oh, darling—darling!" says the young man with passion. He holds her hands closely, and looks into her troubled eyes, and wishes he might dare take her into his arms and, pressing her to his heart, ask her to repeat her words again. But there is something in the calm purity of her beautiful face that repels vehemence of any sort; and as yet—although the dawn is near—her love has not declared itself to her own soul in all its strength.
"I have at least one consolation," he says, at last, calling to mind the quietude that surrounds Moyne and its inhabitants, and the withdrawal from society that has obtained there for many years. "As you are not allowed to see me,—except on such rare occasions as the present when the Fates are kind,—you cannot at least see any one else,—often, that is."
"Meaning?——"
"Ryde."
She laughs a little, and then colors.