"Whereas you," I continued, disregarding the lovely refrain of her tear-choked voice, "are standing on the wonderful threshold of life, waiting in dreamland for the dawn. And it will come, and with it the fairy prince, with whom you shall wander hand in hand through all its fairy rose-gardens; but I, dear Nicolete,—I am not he."
Nicolete did not speak.
"I know," I continued, pressing her hand, "that I may seem young enough to talk like this, but some of us get through life quicker than others, and when we say, 'It is done,' it is no use for onlookers to say, 'Why, it is just beginning!' Believe me, Nicolete, I am not fit husband for you."
"Then shall I take no other," said Nicolete, with set face.
"Oh, yes, you will," I rejoined; "let but a month or two pass, and you will see how wise I was, after all. Besides, there are other reasons, of which there is no need to speak—"
"What reasons?"
"Well," I said, half laughing, "there is the danger that, after all, we mightn't agree. There is nothing so perilously difficult as the daily intercourse of two people who love each other. You are too young to realise its danger. And I couldn't bear to see our love worn away by the daily dropping of tears, not to speak of its being rent by the dynamite of daily quarrels. We know each other's tastes, but we know hardly anything of each other's natures."
Nicolete looked at me strangely. 'Troth, it was a strange way to make love, I knew.
"And what else?" she asked somewhat coldly.
"Well, then, though it's not a thing one cares to speak of, I'm a poor man—"