"Oh, don't speak about it."
"Well, I'll cut that bit out; but please let me finish. You know I've been in love with you for ages, though I did my best to get it under when a better man appeared; and I think you'll admit I haven't worried you much since. And I'm perfectly aware that you can't give me what you gave him…. Still, Doris, I'm not a bad fellow, and you could make me a finer one, and—well, I'd hope not to bore you with my devotion and all that, but, of course, you'd have to take that risk as well as your parents' disapproval. Perhaps I ought to have waited longer, dear, but I didn't imagine my chances would be any greater a year hence, and it has seemed to me lately that—that you needed some one who would care for you before and above everything else…. Doris, remembering how long I've loved you, can't you trust me and take me for—for want of a better?"
His words had moved her, and moments passed before she could answer. "Dear Teddy, it is true that I want to be cared for—no need to deny it to you—but it wouldn't be right to take all you could give and give nothing."
"You would give much without knowing it," he pleaded. "And you were not made to be sorry all your life."
"I'm not going to make you sorry, Teddy."
"You're doing it as hard as you can!"
She smiled in spite of herself. "No," she said presently, "I've no intention of shunning all joys and abandoning all hopes, but I can't do what you ask, Teddy. I will tell you just one thing that you may not know. Almost at the last moment before Alan went away I promised him I would wait."
Teddy cleared his throat. "I didn't know, though I may have guessed…. But I do know, Doris—I felt it on my way here to-night—that Alan, if he could look into my heart now, would give me his blessing. I'm not asking to fill his place, you know."
"Oh, you make it very hard for me! You—you've been such a faithful friend."
"Give in, Doris, give in to me!" He rose and stood looking down on her bowed head. "Dear, I'd bring Alan back to you if I could. Don't you believe that?"