"Couldn't you?" he asked, and he fell into a forlorn silence, as if he could not say anything more. He forced her to take the word by asking, "Then you are offended with me?"
"How could I be?"
"Oh—"
"It's what any girl might be glad of—"
"Oh, my—"
"And I am not so silly as to think there can be a wrong time for it. If there were, you would make it right, if you chose it. You couldn't do anything I should think wrong. And I—I—love you, too—"
"Suzette! Suzette!" he called wildly, as if she were a great way off. It seemed to him his heart would burst. He got awkwardly before her, and tried to seize her hand.
She slipped by him, with a pathetic "Don't! But you know I never could be your wife. You know that."
"I don't know it. Why shouldn't you?"
"Because I couldn't bring my father's shame on my husband."