"Oh, pitiful Heaven!" she wailed, "how can I tell you the truth, my own Ronald?"
He looked at her in wonder.
"Lina, what is it?" he asked. "You will not refuse to marry me here and now—you cannot be so cruel. Think, love, you would have been my wife last night if all had gone well, and you cannot now refuse my prayer to make you mine in the moment of my suffering and sorrow. Think what a comfort it would be to me to have my own little wife for my patient, loving nurse—or perhaps that would be too great a burden for you, Lina?"
"No, no; it would be too great a pleasure," she replied eagerly. "How could I think any task performed for you would be a burden, Ronald?"
"Then you will marry me to-night, Lina, will you not, my darling?"
She looked at the pale, handsome face, with its anxious eyes and winning smile, and her heart gave a great, suffocating throb of terrible pain.
"Ronald, I cannot—to-night," she said, falteringly.
"To-morrow, then?" he said.
"That is too soon," she answered, looking away from him that he might not see the pain in her face. "We must defer it. Let us wait until you get well."
An expression of the keenest disappointment came over the handsome face.