you see now why you've got to love me? What was it you loved in
me once that I haven't got now? How am I different? What do I lack?
Look into my eyes--close--deep down--read my heart! Never, as God is my
judge, have I done a thing since I last kissed your forehead, that you
would have been ashamed of. Do you think, now that you are free, that I
am going back without you? I am not that kind of a man."

She half started from her seat: "Harry!" she cried in a helpless
tone--"you do not know what you are saying--you must not--"

He leaned over and took both her hands firmly in his own.

"Look at me! Tell me the truth--as you would to your God! Do you love
me?"

She made an effort to withdraw her hands, then she sank back.

"I--I--don't know--" she murmured.

"YOU DO--search again--way down in your heart. Go over every day we have
lived--when we were children and played together--all that horror at
Moorlands when I shot Willits--the night of Mrs. Cheston's ball when
I was drunk--all the hours I have held you in my arms, my lips to
yours--All of it--every hour of it--balance one against the other. Think
of your loneliness--not mine--yours--and then tell me you do not know!
You DO know! Oh, my God, Kate!--you must love me! What else would you
want a man to do for you that I have not done?"

He stretched out his arms, but she sprang to her feet and put out her
palms as a barrier.

"No. Let me tell you something. We must have no more
misunderstandings--you must be sure--I must be sure. I have no right to
take your heart in my hands again. It is I who have broken my faith with
you, not you with me. I was truly your wife when I promised you here on
the sofa that last time. I knew then that you would, perhaps, lose your
head again, and yet I loved you so much that I could not give you up.
Then came the night of your father's ball and all the misery, and I was
a coward and shut myself up instead of keeping my arms around you and
holding you up to the best that was in you, just as Uncle George begged
me to do. And when your father turned against you and drove you from
your home, all because you had tried to defend me from insult, I saw
only the disgrace and did not see the man behind it; and then you went
away and I stretched out my arms for you to come back to me and only
your words echoed in my ears that you would never come back to me until
you were satisfied with yourself. Then I gave up and argued it out and
said it was