"Because I don't see any adequate reason," I returned. "Last year I told you mine, now I demand yours."
I kept my arm round her, and could feel the pulses in her waist throb under it, but I turned my eyes away from her and stared fixedly at the carpet, waiting for her to speak, with the best patience I could command.
"I have told you till I am tired of telling you I must get better first," she said, pettishly.
"But you are not getting better," I persisted.
"On the contrary, all these four months you have been getting steadily worse."
So long a silence followed this that I looked into her face again suddenly, the lips were quivering, and the eyes brimming with tears. She turned her head away, but not before I had seen them.
"Dearest, would you rather I released you from your promise to me?" I said, bending nearer over her. "Do you wish that?"
One single, violent sob shook the lovely breast beneath me and swelled the throat.
"No," she said, passionately; "you know I don't!"
"There is no alternative between that or our marriage," I said, quietly.