"Tommy, dear, don't!"
His name was not Tommy, but everybody had called him Tommy for so long because it seemed to go naturally with his surname that now he had almost forgotten what he had really been christened, but it sounded sweet from Marie's lips, and he kissed passionately the little hand that would have silenced his pleading.
"I love you—I love you!" he said again.
She shook her head. She knew that she ought to have been angry with 134 him, but there was something very comforting to her sore heart in this boy's love.
"It's no good. Tommy," she said gently, "and you know it isn't. Even if I cared for you—and I don't, not in that way—you're so young, and . . . and I'm married . . ." And then, with a very real burst of emotion, she added: "We were such good friends, and now you've gone and spoilt it all."
"I couldn't help it—it had to come—and I'm glad. I've never felt like a friend to you. I thought you knew it, but if you want me to I'll go on being your friend all my life," he added inconsequently.
Her tears came again at that, and Tommy got out his handkerchief—a nice, soft silk one which he had faintly scented for the occasion— and wiped her eyes for her, and reproached himself, and comforted her all in a breath, till she looked up and smiled again.
"And now we've been thoroughly foolish," she said with a little sob, "please be a dear, and take me for a walk."
"It hasn't been foolishness," he answered, with a new manliness that surprised her and made her feel a little ashamed. "I love you, and I shall always love you, but if you only want me for a friend— well, that's all there is to be said."
She took his hand and held it hard for a moment.