"'Dust is dust, to dust returneth,
Was not written of the soul.'"
Upon the evening of that day, spent as such evenings are, in subdued conversation at a hearthside, Leaver came across the room and spoke to Charlotte.
"I am wondering," he said, "if a short walk in the night air won't make you fitter for sleep than you look now. It is mild and fine outside. Will you come?"
"It will do you good, Miss Ruston," urged her hostess, who had taken a strong liking to Dr. Leaver. The Macauleys seconded the suggestion also, and Charlotte, somewhat reluctantly as to outward manner, but, in spite of sorrow and physical fatigue, with a strong leap of the heart, made ready.
As her companion closed the door behind them Charlotte understood that she was alone with him at last, as she had not been alone with him in all these days, even when no person was present. She had small time in which to recognize what was coming, for, almost instantly, it was at hand. There was a small park opposite the house, and to the deserted walk which circled it she found herself led.
"Dear," Leaver's voice began, in its tenderest inflection, "I have a curious feeling that no words can make it any clearer between us than it already is. Last winter we knew how it was with us—didn't we? Won't you tell me that you knew? It is my dearest belief that you did."
"Yes, I knew," Charlotte answered, very low.
"To me it was the most beautiful thing I had ever dreamed of, that two people could so understand and belong to each other before a word was said. When the time came to speak, and—the thing had happened that made it impossible, I can never tell you what it meant to me. When I found you there in the North it seemed as if the last ounce had been added to the burden I was bearing. I couldn't ask for your friendship; I couldn't have taken it if you had given it to me. I had to have all or nothing. Can you understand that?"
She nodded. She put up one hand and lifted the thin black veil she was wearing, and turned her face upward to the stars. They were very bright, that February night, down in South Carolina.
"But now," he went on, after a moment, "it is all plain before us. Charlotte, am I a strangely presumptuous lover to take so much for granted? I don't even ask if you have changed. Knowing you, that doesn't seem possible to me. I have never wooed you, I have simply—recognized you! You belonged to me. I was sure that you so recognized me. It has been as I dreamed it would be, when I was a boy, dreaming my first dreams about such things. I have known many women—have had a few of them for my very good friends. I never cared to play at love with any one; it didn't interest me. But when I saw you I loved you. I won't say 'fell in love;' that's not the phrase. I loved you. The love has grown with every day I have known you—grown even when I thought it was to be denied."