"It is folly and senseless folly to go," she continued calmly, while he gasped within and felt a mist crowding down on the world. "You like me too, a little—and you're enlarging my mind beyond the limits of this wilderness of eternal grass and hay. Why, when Providence throws a little sunshine upon me, should I rush indoors out of it and draw down the blinds?"
He was going to mention Christopher again, but felt such an act would be unfair to the man in Honor's present mood. For a moment he opened his mouth to argue the point she raised, then realised the danger and futility. Only by an assumption of carelessness amounting to the brutal could he keep his secret out of his voice. And in the light of what she had confessed so plainly, to be less frank himself was most difficult. Her words had set his heart beating like a hammer. His mind was overwhelmed with his first love, and to such a man it was an awful emotion. It shook him and unsteadied his voice as he looked at her, for she had never seemed more necessary to him than then.
"Don't be so serious," he said. "Your horizon will soon begin to enlarge with the coming interests. I've enjoyed my long visit more than I can tell you—much more than I can tell you; but go I must indeed."
"Stop just one fortnight more, Myles?"
"Don't ask it, Honor. It's hard to say 'No' to you."
"A week—a little week—to please me? Why shouldn't you please me? Is it a crime to do that? I suppose it is, for nobody ever thinks of trying to."
"I cannot alter my plans now. I must go on Saturday."
"Go, then," she said. "I'm rewarded for being so rude as to ask so often. I'm not nearly proud enough. That's a distinction you've not taught me to achieve with all your lessons."
She left him, but he overtook her in two strides, and walked at her right hand.
"Honor, please listen to me."