When both the letters were gone, I tried to dismiss the subject from my mind, and when it came back to me, I endeavoured to turn my tired thoughts into prayer, and in this way found comfort and relief.
The following afternoon, as I was writing letters in the little schoolroom, which was the next room to my bedroom, and the window of which also looked out over the garden to the hills beyond, I heard a hasty step on the stairs.
Maggie was spending the day with a playfellow of hers in the village, and it was not Maggie's step. No, I knew the step well, and my heart beat fast, and I felt myself growing paler and paler every moment.
The door opened, and Claude entered without any ceremony. He looked tired and troubled, and his clothes were covered with dust from his long journey.
"May," he said, "I got your letter this morning, and I have come off at once. The Fitzgeralds thought I was mad, I believe; I started up from the breakfast-table and said I must catch the nine o'clock train. But I could not have waited another day; it would have been utterly impossible, May."
I tried to speak, but my heart was beating so quickly now that my words seemed as if they would choke me.
"And now, May," Claude said, hurriedly, sitting down by my side and taking my hand, "I want you to tell me what you meant by that cruel letter you sent me; or, rather, I want you to tell me that it was all a mistake, all a delusion, that you have thought better of it since, and that you wish you had never written it. I want you to tell me, May, darling," he said in a lower voice, "that the dream of my life is to be changed into a reality this very week. I want you to tell me that the bright days which I have always said were in store for us both are now close at hand."
"Claude, dear Claude," I said, as soon as I was able to speak, "you have my answer; as a sister, as a friend, I will always love you, but I cannot, cannot be your wife."
"And pray why not, May?" he said, impatiently rising, and walking towards the window. "What absurd idea have you got in your head now? Who, or what is to hinder you from becoming my wife, I should like to know?"
"Claude, I cannot," I said; and the tears would come, in spite of all my efforts to keep them back.