"O?" says she, looking at me askance.
"Our days fly all too fast, Damaris, here is a time I fain would linger upon, an I might."
"It hath been a very wonderful time truly, Martin, and hath taught me very much. We are both the better for it, I think, and you—"
"What of me, comrade?" I questioned as she paused.
"You are grown so much gentler since your sickness, so much more my dear friend and companion."
"Why, 'tis all your doing, Damaris."
"I am glad—O very glad!" says she almost in a whisper.
"Why, 'tis you who have taught me to—to love all good, sweet things, to rule myself that I—I may some day, mayhap, be a little more worthy of—of—" here, beginning to flounder, I came to sudden halt, and casting about in my mind for a likely phrase, saw her regarding me, the dimple in her cheek, but her eyes all compassionate and ineffably tender.
"Dear man!" says she, and reached me her hand.
"Damaris," says I heavily and looking down at these slender fingers, yet not daring to kiss them lest my passion sweep me away, "you know that I do love you?"