She shook her head.
"Well, is there anything you can suggest?" he asked. "Any way out of the difficulty that occurs to you? Believe me——"
"No," she said, "I can see nothing that is practicable; I——"
"Would you be willing to come on the nursing-staff here? We're short-handed in the night work. It is an opening, and it might lead to a permanent appointment."
Her heart began to beat rapidly; for an instant she did not reply.
"It is very considerate of you, very generous; but I am afraid that wouldn't do."
"Why not?"
"It wouldn't do, because—well, I should have left Westport in any case."
"You meant to, I know. But between the way you'd have left Westport if my mother had lived, and the way you'd leave it now, there is a vast difference."
"I must leave it, all the same."