"I could not go down," he muttered.
She sat down, and with her whole soul in her dark eyes looked up at him. "You wished to avoid me."
His silence was an answer in the affirmative.
"Have you no pity for me? Do you think I have no shame? Who is there in your church that has your interest at heart as I have?"
There was no one. Her love for him was unwomanly in its forwardness, yet it was sincere.
"Come away from here," she said, pleadingly, "come with me. My aunt likes you. We can go where we will. You need never see this place again."
He clenched his hands at her words, and his face, in his mortal struggle with himself, was more like the face of a beast than a man, yet she did not quail.
"It disgusts me," she cried, springing to her feet and laying a hand on his quivering breast, "the way in which these uneducated people order you about. It almost makes me despise you. Are you willing to pass your life here? Can you be content to live in this poor way—these howling children surrounding you—in these stuffy rooms? You who are so, so—" and her head sank on his arm—"you who would become a palace."
"And after death the judgment," he said, in a husky voice. "Do you know the vows that I have taken? Can you promise me peace of mind after I have broken them?"
"Yes," she said, boldly. "I can promise you more than you have now."