He drew closer, and under the window.
“How are you this morning, Elfride? You look no better for your long night’s rest.”
She appeared at the door shortly after, took his offered arm, and together they walked slowly down the gravel path leading to the river and away under the trees.
Her resolution, sustained during the last fifteen hours, had been to tell the whole truth, and now the moment had come.
Step by step they advanced, and still she did not speak. They were nearly at the end of the walk, when Knight broke the silence.
“Well, what is the confession, Elfride?”
She paused a moment, drew a long breath; and this is what she said:
“I told you one day—or rather I gave you to understand—what was not true. I fancy you thought me to mean I was nineteen my next birthday, but it was my last I was nineteen.”
The moment had been too much for her. Now that the crisis had come, no qualms of conscience, no love of honesty, no yearning to make a confidence and obtain forgiveness with a kiss, could string Elfride up to the venture. Her dread lest he should be unforgiving was heightened by the thought of yesterday’s artifice, which might possibly add disgust to his disappointment. The certainty of one more day’s affection, which she gained by silence, outvalued the hope of a perpetuity combined with the risk of all.
The trepidation caused by these thoughts on what she had intended to say shook so naturally the words she did say, that Knight never for a moment suspected them to be a last moment’s substitution. He smiled and pressed her hand warmly.