She realized all at once that her heart had still kept alive a little fire of hope burning before the shrine of its unacknowledged love. The quenching of this spark of hope was almost like the going out of life itself.
The other members of the party had gone on to the other side of the bridge and she was alone with Clifford Standish—alone with the agony of soul that blanched her sweet face to death-like pallor, and made her clutch at the rails, gasping out that she was ill, dying.
The arch-villain caught her swaying form and held it tenderly in his arms, while her white, unconscious face rested against his shoulder.
Some country people walking over the bridge at that moment stared in amazement, and going on to town, reported that, "those actor-folks were carrying on dreadful on the bridge—hugging right before folks."
But neither of the two participants was troubled over this sensation, Geraldine being unconscious, and Standish too much absorbed in her to heed aught else.
In a minute or two she sighed and opened her eyes.
"Oh!" she cried, as she met his eyes gazing deep into hers, and tried to struggle from his clasp.
"Wait. You cannot stand alone yet," he said, tenderly, then murmured: "Oh, Geraldine, it breaks my heart to find that you loved him, that low fireman, so unworthy of you; while I—I—have worshiped you ever since the hour I first saw you behind the counter, so bright and beautiful. I have been trying to win you ever since, and hoped—vainly hoped, as I see now—that I was succeeding. Oh, how did he succeed—this man you saw but a few hours—in winning your love?"
She struggled from his clasp, her strength returning, her face hot with blushes of fierce shame.
"It—it—is not true that I love him—no, no, no!" she faltered, wildly.