"No, indeed, but you are not going yet. You will certainly stay to luncheon, will you not?"
"I cannot—thanks!"
"You shall have all the flowers you want. What are your favorites? Pray help yourself to all you fancy, and welcome," she urged, earnestly.
He glanced around. Everything rare, and sweet, and bright he could think of, glowed lavishly around him, but the only white rose that had blown that day she had quite mechanically broken and placed on her breast.
"I only want one flower. I like white roses best," he answers.
She turned her head, bending forward to see if any were there, and one of her long, fair curls swept across and tangled itself in a thorny bush beside her. She caught it impatiently away, leaving a tangle of broken gold strands on the thorny stem. Before she turned back to him he had broken off the spray and hid it in his breast.
"There is not a rose," lifting regretful eyes to his face, "excepting this one I wear. I carelessly broke it, but it is still fresh. You are welcome to that, if you will have it," she said, sweetly.
"If you please."
She disengaged it, and put it in his hand. He retained hers a moment.
"Thanks, and—good-by."