And I, faced with the inevitable, could only put the question I had put so many times before. "But could you not stay with me here, Yasma? Could you not—"
"No, no, no!" she interrupted, in the midst of her tears. "I could not, could not! Yulada would not permit it!"
"Not even for me?" I entreated, as one might entreat a favor of a refractory child.
"Not even for you! Could I make my heart stop beating for you? Could I cease breathing and still live because you wished it of me? No, no, no, do not ask me to change my nature!"
"I would not ask you to change your nature, Yasma," I assured her gently, as I took her again into my arms. "But I love you so much, my dearest, so much that I can hardly bear to think of being parted from you."
"Or I to be parted from you!"
Mastered once more by her emotion, she turned from me, wringing her hands.
A long, silent moment intervened before she faced me again. But when she did turn to me, her face was more composed, and her eyes shone with new resolution.
"Let us try to be brave, my beloved," she urged. "I will stay with you here a while yet; will stay as long as Yulada permits. And what if, after I go, the winter must come?—it will pass, and the green leaves will grow again, and the snow will melt on the mountainsides; and I will come back, come back with the first northward-flying birds!"
She paused, and smiled in melancholy reassurance. But I did not reply, and the smile quickly faded; and she continued, pleadingly, "Remember, my beloved, when you asked me to marry you, you said you were willing to lose me half the year. You promised, or I could never have consented. So why are you not willing now?"