"Algy," she whispered, "it is good to hear that, and you know that I love you, too, and now good-bye, my dear—I can't bear any more."
She rose quickly and drew her hand away. She passionately longed for him to take her in his arms.
He got up also, he was extremely pale, and more than a suspicion of mist hung upon his eyelashes. As a young, splendid lover, he could not have looked more desirable, but Katherine Bush never lost her head.
"Good-bye, Algy, and God bless you, dear."
Two people were approaching or he certainly would have kissed her—as it was they only wrung each other's hands and Katherine Bush turned and walked into the gathering twilight.
He watched her until she had disappeared and then sat down again. He felt quite wretched. She seemed to him to be a wonderful character.
"What an impotent wretch I am beside her," he said to himself. "But I should never be able to make the family see it. My mother would rather I married Elaine Percival with her five thousand a year—" then he laughed contemptuously—"Elaine Percival!"
For the first time in his life he began to reason about things. Katherine Bush was of course perfectly right. Marriage would have been madness, as he had always known before he became too much in love to think; and he knew he had been lately only entirely influenced by selfish desire, and had never so much as faced what the consequences would be either to himself or to her. He had been quite ready to make a hash of both their lives just because he wanted her so badly for the moment. What an incredible fool—and she, this fine girl, had pulled them both on to firm land. He was not of the type who could contemplate asking a woman to wait for him while he worked to obtain a home for her; such an idea, of course, never entered his head. He had no romantic illusions of this sort, and once having realised the hopelessness of the case he had stoicism enough to accept it. But the things she had said affected him deeply. He would try not to drift.—He would pull himself together and do his best to become a fine soldier. They should not say he had grumbled over going to Egypt. Oh! if there could only be a war, that he might go out and fight! But wars would never happen again at this time of the world's day!
The present pleasant, easy stage of his life had come to an end, and unpleasant realities must be dealt with, but he would keep ever the memory of this splendid girl in his heart, the memory that she had not been weak or permitted him to make a fool of himself or of her.
And as he walked on out of the Park he felt a new self-reliance and determination.