“I believe you,” answered Katharine, looking at the rug again. “It isn’t that. But I won’t let you think for one instant that there’s the least possibility of my ever caring for you, or marrying you. It’s absolutely impossible.”
“Nothing’s impossible!” he answered, impetuously. “Nothing except that you should never care at all when I’d give my life for your little finger, and my soul for your life—with all my heart, and be glad to give either—”
“It hurts me very much to hear you talk like this—because you’ve been misled and deceived—my father and mother—”
“How can they know what you think and feel?” asked Wingfield. “I only spoke to them because it seemed right and fair, being so much in earnest, and I couldn’t tell but what there might be some one else—I had no right to pry into your secrets and watch you and try and find out—it wouldn’t have seemed nice. So I asked your father, and then Mrs. Lauderdale—but I didn’t suppose they knew absolutely—of course they couldn’t answer for you—in that way. And I say it again—don’t make up your mind—don’t send me off—wait—only wait! You don’t know how love grows out of what seems to be nothing till it’s bigger and stronger than the biggest and strongest of us—you can’t feel it growing any more than you could feel that you were growing yourself when you were small; and you can’t remember when it began, any more than you can remember what you thought of when you were a year old. That doesn’t make it less real afterwards—love’s such a little thing at the beginning, and by and by it takes in everything, so that the whole world is nothing beside it. And if you’ll only not make up your mind—”
“It’s made up for me, long ago—in a way you don’t dream of. It’s absolutely, and wholly, and altogether impossible, and it always will be, no matter what happens. Oh, I can’t say more than that, Mr. Wingfield—and it wouldn’t be true if I said less!”
“But it can’t be really true!” he protested, bending forward in his low chair. “Of course you think so—but how can you possibly tell? I don’t mean to say that you’re changeable, or capricious, or anything of that kind—but people do change, you know. Why—I hate to say it—but you couldn’t say more than that if you were married and I didn’t know it!”
Katharine started, though she was strong and her nerves were good. He had made the reflection very naturally, in answer to the very positive words she had spoken. But to her it seemed as though he must know, or at least guess, the truth. She lost her balance for a moment, as she gazed earnestly into his honest black eyes.
“Mr. Wingfield—do you know what you’re saying?” she asked, in a low voice.
He was afraid he had said something monstrous, and his face fell.
“I didn’t mean to offend you,” he stammered, awkwardly. “I’m awfully sorry if I said anything I shouldn’t—”