“Then—then why—” she whispered.—“Would it be so hard to love me?”
“It would be very easy,” he said, “but I dare not let myself.”
She looked at him piteously. “You are so cold—so merciless!” she cried.
He answered nothing, and she sat trembling. “Have you ever loved a woman?” she asked.
There was a long pause. He sat in the chair again. “Listen, Mrs. Winnie”—he began at last.
“Don’t call me that!” she exclaimed. “Call me Evelyn—please.”
“Very well,” he said—“Evelyn. I did not intend to make you unhappy—if I had had any idea, I should never have seen you again. I will tell you—what I have never told anybody before. Then you will understand.”
He sat for a few moments, in a sombre reverie.
“Once,” he said, “when I was young, I loved a woman—a quadroon girl. That was in New Orleans; it is a custom we have there. They have a world of their own, and we take care of them, and of the children; and every one knows about it. I was very young, only about eighteen; and she was even younger. But I found out then what women are, and what love means to them. I saw how they could suffer. And then she died in childbirth—the child died, too.”
Montague’s voice was very low; and Mrs. Winnie sat with her hands clasped, and her eyes riveted upon his face. “I saw her die,” he said. “And that was all. I have never forgotten it. I made up my mind then that I had done wrong; and that never again while I lived would I offer my love to a woman, unless I could devote all my life to her. So you see, I am afraid of love. I do not wish to suffer so much, or to make others suffer. And when anyone speaks to me as you did, it brings it all back to me—it makes me shrink up and wither.”