“I heard one say, not many days gone,” remarked Clarice—not meaning to let Heliet know from whom she had heard it—“that when she was young she loved a squire of her father, which did let her from wedding with him; and that now she was right thankful it so were, for he was killed on the field, and left never a plack behind him, and she was far better off, being now wed unto a gentleman of wealth and substance. What shouldst thou say to that?”
“If it were one of any kin to thee I would as lief say nothing to it,” was Heliet’s rather dry rejoinder.
“Nay, heed not that; I would fain know.”
“Then I think the squire may have loved her, but so did she never him.”
“In good sooth,” said Clarice, “she told me she slept many a night on a wet pillow.”
“So have I seen a child that had broken his toy,” replied Heliet, smiling.
Clarice saw pretty plainly that Heliet thought such a state of things was not love at all.
“But how else can love be outlived?” she said.
“Love cannot. But sorrow may be.”
“Some folks say love and sorrow be nigh the same.”