“It's—it's impossible,” I said, bitterly.
“Impossible? Why?”
“Well, she—she feels so horribly grateful to me that—that if I asked her to be my wife, I—I suppose she would think it her duty to say yes.”
Betsey laughed, and we walked along in silence for half a minute. Then she stopped, and her glowing eyes looked into mine as she said, very soberly:
“Havelock, you're a strange boy. I don't want to spoil you, but I think—well, I won't say what I think.”
So I never knew what she thought, but I well remember there were tears in her eyes and mine as we walked in silence. She was the first to speak.
“If Florence said yes, it would be because she loves you,” said Betsey.
“But you do not know all that I know,” was my answer.
“I want to be decently modest, but I know some things that you do not,” she declared.
Then, as if she dared go no further in that direction, she timidly veered about.