"It's a wonderful thing," said John Henry slowly, "and it taught me a lot just to look at them. I don't know why, but it seemed to make me understand how much I care about you, Susan."
"Hadn't you suspected it before?" asked Susan as calmly as he had spoken. Emotionalism, she knew, she would never find in John Henry's wooing, and, though she could not have explained the reason of it to herself, she liked the brusque directness of his courtship. It was part of that large sincerity of nature which had first attracted her to him.
"Of course, in a way I knew I cared more for you than for anybody else—but I didn't realize that you were more to me than Virginia had ever been. I had got so in the habit of thinking I was in love with her that it came almost as a surprise to me to find that it was over."
"I knew it long ago," said Susan.
"Why didn't you make me see it?"
"Oh, I waited for you to find it out yourself. I was sure that you would some day."
"Do you think you could ever care for me, Susan?"
A smile quivered on Susan's lips as she looked up at him, but with the reticence which had always characterized her, she answered simply:
"I think I could, John Henry."
His hand reached down and closed over hers, and in the long look which they exchanged under the flickering street lamp, she felt suddenly that perfect security which is usually the growth of happy years. Whatever the future brought to them, she knew that she could trust John Henry's love for her.