Prudence withdrew her hand immediately. The two sat in silence, both gazing straight ahead with a look in their eyes as if they saw nothing.

"You will be so much happier with Caro than you would have been with me." Prudence spoke quite cheerfully. "I don't suppose I would have been anything like a model wife, and Caro will be. She'll be always wanting you to be comfortable; while I—I shouldn't have been so thoughtful, I'm afraid; I should only have just—" She stopped abruptly.

Lawrence, with his face still straight ahead, repeated:

"Only have just—"

"Loved you,"—in a tone so penetrating and so sweet that the man who heard it looked like a stone man, in that he made no visible response. She went on directly, in a matter-of-fact way, "I mean, you know, if things had gone on as we once planned."

"If you had not jilted me."

"Yes." She hesitated, and then said, "But you just told me that you forgave me."

"So I do."

"You ought; for if I had not done that, you wouldn't now be engaged to Caro; and you'll be so happy with her."

Lawrence moved uneasily. He glanced about him indefinitely. It did not seem to him as if he could abruptly walk away from this girl.