For answer she held out the telegram. "He sent me this to-day," she said, "and I wonder--if he is waiting."
"Waiting!" echoed Ted hotly. "Waiting for what? You say you refused him?"
"Yes! I told him I would not marry him--because I was afraid of loving him too much; that was the truth."
For one instant the whole room seemed to spin round with Ted; he had to steady himself by holding to the back of a chair.
"I don't understand what you mean," he said thickly.
"I don't think he did either," she replied with a lingering regret in her voice, "for he said he would ask me again in two months, as if that would alter anything."
Ted caught swiftly at the ray of light. "Then if he asked you again--you--you would refuse him?"
The firelight had died down so that he could not see the flush which surged into her face, but he could hear her voice as she replied, "Yes! I should refuse him--more than ever."
"Then," he said slowly after a pause, "I don't see why you need bother----"
"Oh! it was not that," she put in quickly. "I was only wondering--you see I know so little, and I have no mother--if he would expect me to wait."