“You do love me, Jack,” she said.
“God knows I do,” he answered, very earnestly, and again his voice quavered.
It was very still in the room, and the dusk was creeping toward the high, narrow windows, filling the corners, and blackening the shadowy places, and then rising from the floor, almost like a tide, till only the faces of the two young people seemed to be above it, still palely visible in the twilight.
Suddenly Katharine rose to her feet, with a quick-drawn breath which was not quite a sigh.
“Pull down the shades, Jack,” she said, as she struck a match and lit the gas at one of the stiff brackets which flanked the mantelpiece.
Ralston obeyed in silence. When he came back she had resumed her seat in the corner of the sofa, and he sat down beside her instead of taking the chair again.
He did not speak at once, though it seemed to him that his heart had never been so full before. As he looked at the lovely girl he felt a thrill of passionate delight that ran through him and almost hurt him, and left him at last with an odd sensation in the throat and a painful sinking at the heart. He did not reflect upon its meaning, and he certainly did not connect it with the reaction following what he had made his nerves bear during the day. He was sincerely conscious that he had never been so deeply, truly in love with Katharine before. She watched him, understanding what he felt, smiling into his eyes, but silent, too. They had known each other since they had been children, and had loved one another since Katharine had been sixteen years old,—more than three whole years, which is a long time for first love to endure, unless it means to be last as well as the first.
“You said you would consent to almost anything,” said Ralston, after a long pause. “It would be very simple for us to be married, in spite of everybody. Shall we? Shall we, dear?” he asked, repeating the question.
“I would almost do that—” She turned her face away and stared at the empty fireplace.
“Say, quite! After all, what can they all do? What is there so dreadful to face, if we do get married? We must, one of these days. Life’s not life without you—and death wouldn’t be death with you, darling,” he added.