start life
afresh.

"I made you happy once.--I could do it again if we were alone."

Teresa's voice broke in upon his reverie, repeating her former argument
in insistent tones. Her blue eyes were so wistful that it seemed cruel
to point out the difference between then and now. Nevertheless it had
to be done.

"I am afraid it would not be so easy. At that time I had no other
thought. Now I _know_!"

"It is not going to make you happy to hanker after a married woman. It
will make you wicked. You will begin to wish in your own heart that he
would--die! It would be like committing a murder in your heart. We are
taught to pray to be delivered from temptation, it would be walking into
it deliberately to stay here,--to allow yourself to go on caring... Oh,
Dane, wouldn't it be better for you, wouldn't it, wouldn't it, to have
me beside you, loving you, helping you, making a home? I don't say it
could be the best thing--the best thing is over--but wouldn't it,
wouldn't it, be better than loneliness, and wandering, or... sin?"

Peignton looked at her helplessly. The deadly logic of her words there
was no denying. A man must have been a stone who had failed to be
touched by her earnestness.

"Teresa, if it were possible--anything that is possible I would promise
at once. But I cannot face marrying just now."

"But you won't break it off!" Teresa cried eagerly. She had now the
first advantage in the fight, and her eye lightened with hope. "Promise
me that, and we will leave the rest... You can make an excuse and go
abroad. There was no time fixed for our wedding, so no one will talk.
And in a few months I could come out to you, and we could be married
abroad, and travel until you heard of another post. I've always wanted
to travel. You said you looked forward to showing me things."

It was quite true. Dane as a world-traveller had found amusement in the
country-bred girl's primitive ideas of sightseeing, and had occupied
occasional spare hours in sketching out programmes of imaginary tours.
The remembrance came back to him with the remoteness of a childish
dream, from which years had sapped the savour. Then he had been
interested, amused; it had seemed a goodly task to act as Teresa's
guide; now the prospect filled him with dreary dread. He saw a mental
picture of himself walking the sunlit streets, with a leaden heart,
dragging through interminable lengths of galleries, sitting over
_tete-a-tete_