"Oh yes—that's true!—I am badly hurt, Robin!" she said, in low trembling accents—"So badly hurt that I think I shall never get over it!"
Surprised, he took her hands in his own with a gentle reverence, though to be able to draw her nearer to him thus, set his heart beating quickly.
"What is it?" he questioned her, anxiously, as all unconsciously she leaned closer towards him and he saw her soft eyes, wet with tears, shining upon him like stars in the gloom. "Is it bad news of Uncle Hugo?"
"Bad news of him, but worse of me!" she answered, sighingly. "Oh,
Robin, shall I tell you?"
He looked at her tenderly. The dark cloak about her had fallen a little aside, and showed a gleam of white neck emerging from snowy drapery underneath—it was, to his fancy, as though a white rose-petal had been suddenly and delicately unfurled. He longed to kiss that virginal whiteness, and trembled at the audacity of his own desire.
"Yes, dear, tell me!" he murmured, abstractedly, scarcely thinking of what he was saying, and only conscious of the thrill and ecstasy of love which seemed to him the one thing necessary for existence in earth or heaven.
And so, with her hands still warmly held in his, she told him all. In a sad voice, with lowered eyes and quivering lips, she related her plaintive little history, disclosing her unbaptised shame,—her unowned parentage,—her desperately forlorn and lonely condition. And Robin listened—amazed and perplexed.
"It seems to be all my fault," concluded Innocent, sorrowfully—"and yet it is not really so! Of course I ought never to have been born—but I couldn't help it, could I? And now it seems quite wrong for me to even live!—I am not wanted—and ever since I was twelve years old your Uncle has only kept me out of charity—"
But at this Robin started as though some one had struck him.
"Innocent!" he exclaimed—"Do not say such a thing!—do not think it!
Uncle Hugo has LOVED you!—and you—you have loved him!"