“You neglected them on Class Day after you saw me.”
“Why, of course I did. How could I help it?”
A flush of pleasure came into the girl's pale face; but she banished it, and continued gravely, “Then at Portland you were with them all day.”
“You'd given me up—you'd thrown me over, Alice,” he pleaded.
“I know that; I don't blame you. But you made them believe that you were very much interested in them.”
“I don't know what I did. I was perfectly desperate.”
“Yes; it was my fault. And then, when they came to meet you at the Museum, I had made you forget them; I'd made you wound them and insult them again. No. I've thought it all out, and we never could be happy. Don't think that I do it from any resentful motive.”
“Alice? how could I think that?—Of you!”
“I have tried—prayed—to be purified from that, and I believe that I have been.”
“You never had a selfish thought.”