“You were going to kill yourself,” he said.
“Yes,” she replied, “I shall kill myself.”
“I knew it! Sit down and listen to me.”
He pushed her on to a divan and sat in front of her.
“I find by my watch that it is but an hour since I left you,” he went on. “I had thought the world had rolled out of its teens. For most of that hour I was mad. Then came back that terrible hunger of heart and soul, a moment of awful, prophetic solitude. Let your past go. I cannot live without you.”
Hermia bent her body until her forehead touched her knees. “I cannot,” she said; “I never could forget, nor could you.”
“I would forget, and so will you. I will make you forget.”
She shook her head. “Life—nothing would ever be the same to me; nor to you—now that I have told you.”
He hesitated a moment. “You did right to tell me,” he said, “for your soul’s peace. And I—I love you the better for what you have suffered. And, my God! think of life without you! Let it go; we will make our past out of our future.”
He sat down beside her and took her in his arms, then drew her across his lap and laid her head against his shoulder.