“Now,” he said, firmly.
“Now? Marry me at once?”
“I love you enough to wait a million years—but I won’t. I always expected to fall in love; I’ve rather fancied it would come like this when it came; and I swore I’d never let the chance slip by. We’re a headlong family—but a singularly loyal one. We love but once in our lifetime; and when we love we know it.”
“Do you think that this is that one time?”
“There is no doubt left in me.”
“Then”—she covered her face with her hands, leaning heavily on the table—“then what on earth are we to do?”
“Promise each other to love.”
“Do you promise?”
“Yes, I do promise, forever. Do you?”
She looked up, pale as a ghost. “Yes,” she said.