of her.

"Nay," she said softly, "I am not bitter."

She felt she could bear anything for him; she would suffer for him. She
put her hand on his knee as he leaned forward in his chair. He took
it and kissed it; but it hurt to do so. He felt he was putting himself
aside. He sat there sacrificed to her purity, which felt more like
nullity. How could he kiss her hand passionately, when it would drive
her away, and leave nothing but pain? Yet slowly he drew her to him and
kissed her.

They knew each other too well to pretend anything. As she kissed him,
she watched his eyes; they were staring across the room, with a peculiar
dark blaze in them that fascinated her. He was perfectly still. She
could feel his heart throbbing heavily in his breast.

"What are you thinking about?" she asked.

The blaze in his eyes shuddered, became uncertain.

"I was thinking, all the while, I love you. I have been obstinate."

She sank her head on his breast.

"Yes," she answered.

"That's all," he said, and his voice seemed sure, and his mouth was
kissing her throat.

Then she raised her head and looked into his eyes with her full gaze of
love. The blaze struggled, seemed to try to get away from her, and
then was quenched. He turned his head quickly aside. It was a moment of
anguish.

"Kiss me," she whispered.

He shut his eyes, and kissed her, and his arms folded her closer and
closer.

When she walked home with him over the fields, he said:

"I am glad I came back to you. I feel so simple with you--as if there
was nothing to hide. We will be happy?"

"Yes," she murmured, and the tears came to her eyes.

"Some sort of perversity in our souls," he said, "makes us not want, get
away from, the very thing we want. We have to fight against that."

"Yes," she said, and she felt stunned.

As she stood under the drooping-thorn tree, in the darkness by the
roadside, he kissed her, and his fingers wandered over her face. In
the darkness, where he could not see her but only feel her, his passion
flooded him. He clasped her very close.

"Sometime you will have me?" he murmured, hiding his face on her
shoulder. It was so difficult.

"Not now," she said.

His hopes and his heart sunk. A dreariness came over him.

"No," he said.

His clasp of her slackened.

"I love to feel your arm THERE!" she said, pressing his arm against her
back, where it went round her waist. "It rests me so."

He tightened the pressure of his arm upo