“I think you are the best, the finest—” began Cis, but he interrupted her with an impatient exclamation.
“Good heavens, Cis, stop! That’s nothing to tell me, nor to feel! Love me; don’t admire me!”
“Isn’t it? I think I couldn’t love anyone I didn’t admire,” said Cis, trying to find her puzzled way. “I loved someone; you know that. I was crazy to see him; it made my breath short when he came; I—One doesn’t love again, does she? But I know now that I couldn’t love him last winter because I didn’t admire him.”
“Cis, dear,” began Anselm, sitting on the edge of the table as if he meant to argue it out, “I think we don’t love again in that same first way; it’s the dream of youth. I had it, too, but I was only a lad of seventeen when I fell madly in love. You were older than I when it happened to you but you were not much older, and you were no more experienced, and experience is what counts in these things. There is a glamor over everything that is part of that time of life, and we have our first love hard. But, dear, it’s not in the same class with our later, mature love. Do you imagine I felt for that little fluffy girl of twenty whom I loved when I was seventeen, anything like what I feel for you? Nor was that first love of yours, which you so bravely conquered for God’s sake, the love you’ll feel for your husband, who will be one with you in all things of soul and body. Cis, honestly—though it may sound conceited—I am sure you love me. Will you be sure of it? Father Morley, Miss Braithwaite, Jeanette, hope for it.”
“Oh! Do they all know?” gasped Cis.
“That I love you? Surely. Blind little Cis not to have known it yourself! But now that you do know it—”
“I couldn’t so much as think of marrying you!” Cis hastily interrupted him. “Why, I’d be—what would I be? One of the people brought into a country to serve it, then deserting its flag—a traitor! That’s it! Miss Braithwaite imported me to live with her, be almost a daughter to her. Much good I’d do her if I—”
“Now, Cicely, can’t you trust Miss Miriam to me?” Anselm interrupted in his turn. “Do you suppose we haven’t discussed my hopes? Haven’t I just told you that she wanted them fulfilled? Good mothers do not want to mortgage their daughters’ lives; they want them to find their own places and happily fill them. Miss Braithwaite shall not lose you if I win you, dear one! She is most anxious for this marriage, Cis. ‘Cis must come to me, Anselm; then you shall woo her at your best. She shall be in her home, the home that holds you part of it, and I hope that will incline her to harken to you. But if not, then at least she is still in her own home; the dear child will be made secure however she decides.’ That is what she said to me, Cicely beloved, before I went away to try to bring you back. Marry me, then there will be another besides ourselves happy; Miss Miriam the third rejoicing.”
“I don’t see how you can possibly mean that you want to marry me!” said Cis slowly abandoning Miss Braithwaite’s cause. “Don’t you think you mean someone else?”
“I distinctly think that I mean no one else!” cried Anselm. “Do I strike you as positively feeble-minded? There’s no difficulty in telling you from all others. I can tell you apart literally, quite apart from all others created! And I’m not grave and settled down; I’m only thirty-eight, darling! Are you thinking of me as solemn, serious, almost elderly? No, no; I’m not! I’m your lover, Cis, and he loves you more than he can tell you. Will you come here, Cis, desire of my heart? Will you help me in the beautiful schemes we’ve discussed? Take my mother’s place, but fill only your own place, my wife’s place, my helpmeet’s place—and more; a thousand times more!”