"What are you going to do?" I asked.
"Send you home," he replied.
"But you are coming with me?"
"No. I shall not trouble Aghadoe any more by my presence. You will be quite safe with the Chauffeur."
"But what are you going to do?"
"I am not going to cut my throat, if that's what you are afraid of. I am going to—console myself as soon as I can."
I did not dare ask him how. He held his arm to me ceremoniously, and I could not help thinking that he could play the fine gentleman after all. My thoughts were so bewildered that I could not take in yet all that this involved, but seeing that he held his arm to me I took it and went out with him.
The night had come on dark outside. Looking back from the gate, I thought that the little house glowed like a ruby in the darkness.
He put me into the carriage with a careful politeness. As he wrapped the rug about me I had a sudden sense of the finality of it and the trouble that lay before me and the others, and a pity for his disappointment as well that was so poignant as to be almost unbearable.
"Forgive me," I whispered in the darkness. "I would have loved you if I could."