In her case, as in thousands of others, it would have been so much better if she had.
Then Edith said, a little dubiously, "I hurt the vines when I tried to water them."
"I know enough about gardening to understand that," said Arden, with a smile. "If the ground is not thoroughly soaked it does hurt them. But see," and he poured the water around the vines till the dry leaves swam in it. "That will last two days, and then I will water these again. I can go over half the bed thoroughly one night, and the other half the next night; and so we will keep them along till rain comes."
She looked at him as if he were a messenger come to release her from a dungeon, and murmured, in a low, sweet voice:
"Mr. Lacey, you are as kind as a brother to me."
A warm flush of pleasure mantled his face and neck, and he turned away to hide his feelings, but said:
"Miss Edith, this is nothing to what I would do for you."
She had it on her lips to tell him how she was situated, but he hastened away to fill his barrel at a neighboring pond. She watched him go to and fro in his rough, working garb, and he seemed to her the very flower of chivalry.
Her eyes grew lustrous with admiration, gratitude, hope, and—yes, love, for before the June twilight deepened into night it was revealed in the depths of her heart that she loved Arden Lacey, and that was the reason that she had kept away from him since she had made the hateful promise. She had thought it only friendship, now she knew that it was love, and that his scorn and anger would be the bitterest ingredient of all in her self-immolation.
For two long hours he went to and fro unweariedly, and then startled her by saying in the distance on his way home, "I will come again to-morrow evening," and was gone. He was afraid of himself, lest in his strong feeling he might break his implied promise not even to suggest his love, when she came to thank him, and so, in self-distrustfulness, he was beginning to shun her also.