Why, I asked myself a thousand times, was I so poor a cur compared with Donald? He had done what I had done, and he had seen his way at once and followed it. He would not live, having, in all innocence and with the most urgent of all reasons, killed his friend. Not that I felt that his solution was my solution. My duty was to leave Margaret and to go to Kate, to help her, to the best of my ability, to live down her sorrow, and to show by my life and conduct that I would pay the price. And here I was, hovering moth-like round the flame.
Then again I would say that I would wait till the inevitable had happened, and Margaret was married to Tiverton. Anything to put it off, that was really all I was capable of.
To me, in my recess, Margaret came one morning.
"I thought you'd gone out, Oliver," she began.
"No," said I. "I altered my mind, and thought I'd like reading better."
"You puzzle me. Are you quite well?"
"As fit as a fiddle," said I cheerily, and rose to give her my seat, for the recess would only hold one.
"You're not to move, sir."
She fetched a couple of cushions, flung them by the window, and curled up on them. I wished she wouldn't, for she made a glorious picture.
"Now, sir, I am going to have it out with you," she said severely and smilingly. I smiled back, and pulled myself together.