“No, I can’t forget,” he answered very firmly. “I don’t want to; but I have no right to bother you with my love, when I have nothing in the world to offer. But I am going away, Eileen. I am going right away out of the country altogether, and some day, if I have succeeded, I shall come back; and if you are free I shall tell you again what I have told you to-day.”
“You are going away!” she repeated incredulously, sitting up and gazing at him with questioning eyes. “Going away!—out of the country!”
“Yes. I ought to have gone before.”
“But the aunties, Jack!—whatever will the aunties do?”
“I am afraid they will feel it very much, but I know they will understand, and I must go.”
“But where to? Have you actually arranged it?”
“Yes. There is a man is Newry named Wilkinson—I don’t know if you know him. He is home from the Argentine for a few months’ holiday. He has a large cattle ranch out there, and he wants me to go back with him. I have decided to go.”
“Oh, Jack!” was all she could say. “Need it have been so far?”
“Beggars can’t be choosers,” with a wintry smile. “I believe it is a good thing. Wilkinson is a nice fellow, and he has done very well in the ten years he has been out there. We were chums at school, you know, and he offers me a better job than anyone else would.”
“Poor aunties! It will half kill them.”