Her face was quite pale. She held out her hand.
"No," he said firmly. "We don't part like that, Wenna. First, let me say that you have nothing to accuse yourself of. You have done nothing and said nothing of which any man, however mean and suspicious, could complain. Perhaps I was too hasty in speaking of my love for you. In that case I've got to pay for my folly."
"And it is folly, Mr. Trelyon," she said passionately, and yet with nothing but tenderness in her face. "How could you have thought of marrying me? Why, the future that ought to lie before you is far more than you can imagine yet; and you would go and hamper it by marrying an innkeeper's daughter! It is folly indeed, and you will see that very soon. But—but I am very sorry all this has occurred: it is another grief to me that I have troubled you. I think I was born to bring grief to all my friends."
He was anxiously debating what he should do; and he needed all his wits at that moment, for his own feelings were strong within him, and clamoring for expression. Should he insist? Should he bear down all opposition? Happily, quieter counsels prevailed, for there was no mistake as to the absolute truthfulness of what the girl had said.
"Well, Wenna," he said, "I will do anything you like, only to remain your friend. Is that possible? Will you forgive all that I have said if I make you a promise not to repeat it, and never again to mention your engagement to Mr. Roscorla?"
"No, we must part now altogether," she said slowly. Then by haphazard she glanced up at his face for a moment, and there was a great sadness in her eyes. "It is a hard thing to part. Perhaps it will not be necessary that you should never come to see me. But we must not be friends as we have been, for I have my duty to do toward him."
"Then I may come to see you sometimes?"
She hesitated: "You may come to see my mother sometimes. And I will always think of you as a dear friend, whether I see you or not."
He went outside, and drew a long breath. "I had to keep a tight grip on the reins that time," he was thinking to himself—"a precious tight grip; but I did it."
He thought of the look there was in her eyes when she finally bid him goodbye. His face grew the happier as he thought of it. He was clearly not at all down-hearted about his rejection: on the contrary, he went and told his cousin Juliott that the little affair of the morning had been quite satisfactorily arranged, that Miss Wenna and he were very good friends again, and that it was quite a mistake to imagine that she was already married to Mr. Roscorla.