“That is enough.”
“It is all—the utmost,” she went on. “I can never marry you. When you loose me from your arms to-night it will be forever. Hold me close a little longer while I tell you.”
Her voice was faint and uncertain; her frame was trembling; he could feel the whole weight of her body upon him, as he held her against his exultant heart, while the power that had come into him gave him a strength so mighty that he supported the sweet burden as if its weight were nothing.
“Go on,” he murmured gently, in a secure and quiet tone, “I am listening.”
“I only want to tell you, if I can, how much I love you. I want you to know it all, that the torment of having it unsaid may leave me.”
Of her own will she raised her arms and put them about his neck, laying down her face on one of them, so that her lips were close against his ear.
“At the first,” she said, “I liked and admired you because I saw you were good and noble. Then I trusted you, and made your truth my anchor in the awful seas of trouble I was tossed in. Then I came to reverence and almost worship you for the highness that is in you, and then, oh, then after my baby died and my other dreadful sorrow came, against my will, in spite of hard fighting and struggling and trying, I went a step higher yet and loved you, with a love that takes in all the rest—that is admiration, and trust, and reverence, and love in one. Oh,” she said with a great sigh, “but it is all in vain! I cannot tell you—I cannot! I say the utmost, and it seems pale and poor and miserably weak. You do not understand the love you have called into being in my poor, broken heart. I thought I should have the comfort of feeling I had told you. I feel only that I have failed! Oh, before we part, I want you to know how I love you—how the stress of it is bursting my heart—how the mightiness of it seems to expand my soul until it touches Heaven. Oh, if I could only ease my heart of its great weight of love by finding words to tell you.”
He put his lips close to her ear.
“One kiss,” he said softly, and then turned them to meet hers.