"You must forget!" she cried. "You must forget me till it is as if you had never known me. I won't be burdened with the knowledge that I'm spoiling your life. I won't!"
"Mary!" he said appealingly.
"Oh," she exclaimed, "it's cruel! I wish to God I had died before you loved me!"
"You don't know what you're saying! You make me feel——Why," he demanded, under his breath—"why could it never be—in time, if you stay? I'll never speak of it any more till you permit it, not a sign shall tell you I'm waiting; but by-and-by—will it be always impossible? Dearest, it holds me so fast, my love of you. Don't be harsher than you need; it's so real, so deep. Don't refuse me the right to hope—in secret, by myself; it's all I have, all I'll ask of you for years, if you like—the right to think that you may be my wife some day. Leave me that!"
"I can't," she said thickly; "it would be a lie."
"You could never care for me—not so much as to let me care for you?"
A movement answered him, and his head was lowered. He sat, his chin supported by his palm, watching the restless working of her hands in her lap. The closing words of the hymn came out distinctly to them both, and they listened till the hush fell, without knowing that they listened.
"May I ask you one thing? You know I shall respect your confidence. Is it because you care for some other man?"
"No, no," she said vehemently, "I do not care!"
"Thank God for that! While there's no one you like better, you'll be the woman I want and wait for to the end."