"Oh!" she faltered, "don't say anything—don't!"
"I must. What's the good?—I keep back everything, and you still know! You'll always know. Nothing could have been more honestly meant than my assurance that I'd never bring distress to you, and I've brought distress. Let's look the thing squarely in the eyes: you, won't be my wife, but you needn't go away. What would you do? Whom do you know? Leaving my loss of you out of the question, think of my self-reproach!"
Inside the church an outburst of children's voices, muffled somewhat by the shut door, but still too near to be wholly beautiful, rose suddenly in a hymn. She stood with averted face, staring over the rankness of the grass that the wind was stirring lightly among the gravestones.
"Let's look at the thing squarely for once," he said again. "We're both remembering I love you—there's nothing gained by pretending. If the circumstances were different, if you had somewhere to go I should have less right to interfere; but as it is, your leaving would mean a constant shame to me. All the time I should be thinking: 'She was at peace in a home, and you drove her out from it!' To see the woman he cares for go away, unprotected, among strangers, to want perhaps for the barest necessaries—what sort of man could endure it? should feel as if I had turned you out of doors." A sudden tremor seized her; she shivered.
"Sit down," he said authoritatively. "We must come to an understanding!"
But his protest was not immediately continued, and in the shelter of the porch both were thoughtful. She was the first to speak again, after all.
"You're persuading me to be a great coward," she said; "and I am not a very brave woman at the best. If I do what is right, I may give you pain for a little while, but I shall spare you the unhappiness you'll have if you go on meeting me."
"You consider my happiness and her happiness, but not your own. And why?—you'd spare me nothing."
"You'll never be satisfied. Oh, yes, let us be honest with each other, you're right! Your misgivings about me are true enough; but you are principally anxious for me to stop that you may still see me. And what'll come of it? I can never marry you, never; and you'll be wretched. If I gave you a chance to forget——"
"I shall never forget, whether you stop or whether you go."