"No, I did not," Winifred answered with sudden energy; "I told him I never could, would, or should marry him,—that I would go on being friends with him as long as he liked, but on condition that he gave up the other idea entirely."
Professor Anstice reached out his thin white scholarly fingers and stroked the rebellious waves of his daughter's hair.
"Winifred," he said, "you are always acting on impulse. You never take time to consider anything, but jump and plunge like a broncho. Now let us talk this matter over calmly: I am afraid you have made a mistake—a serious mistake, my dear, though it may not be too late to remedy it."
"There is nothing to remedy," said Winifred, with a tremulous attempt at cheerfulness; "he asked me and I said 'No,' and he said he should never ask me again, and I said I hoped he wouldn't, or something like that, and so the matter ended; and I am always going to live with you and be good to you,—and you won't be sorry for that, will you?"
"I should be very sorry if it came about so. Listen, Winifred. Because you see me a delver in dusty old books, you think perhaps that I don't know what love is; but I tell you as I grow older it comes to fill a larger and larger part of the horizon, to seem perhaps the only reality. I don't mean just the love of a man for a woman, but the great throbbing bond of human affection and sympathy; and of all the kinds of affection, there is none that has the strength and toughness that belong to the love of husband and wife. I wish you to marry, Winifred,—I have always wished it,—only let it be to a true man, my dear,—let it be to a true man!"
"Father, he is a true man," said Winifred, speaking low and with a timidity wholly new to her.
"I think so,—I earnestly believe it. He seems to me to have more ability, more strength, and more tenderness than he has shown yet. Some wrong ideas have twisted themselves persistently among the very fibres of his life and warped it; but it is not yet too late to tear them away."
"Some one else may do it," said Winifred, in exaggerated discouragement, "I let the opportunity slip by. He will never ask me again, and as for me—do you think I will ever go to any man with the offer of my love? Not if my heart broke for him!"