"It was then," she answered, aloud, "that I first felt in my own breast the danger of loving you. That made me afraid—yes, much afraid."
"And why were you afraid, dear love?" Wat questioned, softly.
"Because in love a woman has to think for herself, and for him who loves her, also. She sees further on. Difficulties loom larger to her. They close in upon her soul and fright her. Then, also, she has to watch within, lest—lest—"
Here the girl stopped and gazed away pensively to the north. She did not finish her sentence.
"Lest what, Kate?" urged Wat, softly, eager for the ending of her confession, for the revelation of the maiden's heart was sweet to him.
"Lest her own heart betray her and open its gates to the enemy," she answered, very low.
She walked on more sharply for a space. She was still thinking, and Wat had the sense not to interrupt her meditation.
"Yet the chief matter of her thought," she went on, "the thought of the girl who is wooed and is in danger of loving, is only to keep the castle so long—and then, when she is sure that the right besieger blows the horn without the gate, she leaps up with joy to draw the bolts of the doors, to fling them wide open, to strike the flag that waves aloft. Then, right glad at heart, she runs to meet her lord in the gateway, with the keys of her life in her hands."
She turned herself suddenly about with a lovely expression of trust in her eyes, and impulsively held out both her own hands.
"Take them," she said, "my lord!"