"Tell me, Claire, do you not know how deeply I love you?"
Silence.
"Claire, Claire, speak to me. End this suspense. Will you not try to love me?"
She moved away from him, and avoiding his eyes, answered in an odd, hard voice: "No, Dr. Vaughan, I will not try to love you."
His next words were uttered almost tremulously. "Ah! I understand. I have displeased you; tell me how."
"You have never displeased me. You are goodness itself. Let me pass, Doctor Vaughan; I must not listen to you."
"Must not? Then you do avoid me?"
"Yes," almost inaudibly.
"Why?" stepping before her and cutting off her retreat.
"I won't tell you. Yes, I will, too. Oh, how blind you are! How can you love me when—when there is some one better, better a thousand times, and braver, too. Some one whose life needs your love, because it has been so loveless always. I won't love you. I won't listen to you. If you want me to be your friend, make the life that is giving its best to others, as happy as it deserves to be. And—don't ever talk—like this—to me again."