'Cruel! cruel!' she said, in a voice that sounded dead and cold, and her arms fell to her side.
He melted at that.
'There, I have hurt you again. What a selfish wretch I am. I shall make a poor thing of life; but I will promise not to die if I can help it. You shall not call me cruel again, Polly.'
Then she smiled, and stretched out her hand to him.
'I would not requite your goodness so badly as that. You could always do as you liked with me in the old days, Polly—turn me round your little finger. If you tell me to get well I suppose I must try; but the best part of me is gone.'
She could not answer him. Every word went through her tender heart like a stab. What avail were her love and pity? Never should she be able to comfort him again; never would her sweet sisterly ministrations suffice for him. She must not linger by his side; her eyes were open now.
'Good-bye, Roy,' she faltered. She hardly knew what she meant by that farewell. Was she going to leave him? Was she only saying good-bye to the past, to girlhood, to all manner of fond foolish dreams? She rose with dry eyes when she had uttered that little speech, while he lay watching her.
'Do you mean to leave me?' he asked, sorrowfully, but not disputing her decision.
'Perhaps—yes—what does it matter?' she answered, moving drearily away.
What did it matter indeed? Her fate and his were sealed. Between them stretched a gulf, long as life, impassable as death; and even her innocent love might not span it.