full of Master Jervie for a very long time.

I wish I could make you understand what he is like and how entirely
companionable we are. We think the same about everything--I am afraid
I have a tendency to make over my ideas to match his! But he is almost
always right; he ought to be, you know, for he has fourteen years'
start of me. In other ways, though, he's just an overgrown boy, and he
does need looking after--he hasn't any sense about wearing rubbers when
it rains. He and I always think the same things are funny, and that is
such a lot; it's dreadful when two people's senses of humour are
antagonistic. I don't believe there's any bridging that gulf!

And he is--Oh, well! He is just himself, and I miss him, and miss him,
and miss him. The whole world seems empty and aching. I hate the
moonlight because it's beautiful and he isn't here to see it with me.
But maybe you've loved somebody, too, and you know? If you have, I
don't need to explain; if you haven't, I can't explain.

Anyway, that's the way I feel--and I've refused to marry him.

I didn't tell him why; I was just dumb and miserable. I couldn't think
of anything to say. And now he has gone away imagining that I want to
marry Jimmie McBride--I don't in the least, I wouldn't think of
marrying Jimmie; he isn't grown up enough. But Master Jervie and I got
into a dreadful muddle of misunderstanding and we both hurt each
other's feelings. The reason I sent him away was not because I didn't
care for him, but because I cared for him so much. I was afraid he
would regret it in the future--and I couldn't stand that! It didn't
seem right for a person of my lack of antecedents to marry into any
such family as his. I never told him about the orphan asylum, and I
hated to explain that I didn't know who I was. I may be DREADFUL, you
know. And his family are proud--and I'm proud, too!

Also, I felt sort of bound to you. After having been educated to be a
writer, I must at least try to be one; it would scarcely be fair to
accept your education and then go off and not use it. But now that I
am going to be able to pay back the money, I feel that I have partially
discharged that debt--besides, I suppose I could keep on being a writer
even if I did marry. The two professions are not necessarily exclusive.

I've been thinking very hard about it. Of course he is a Socialist,
and he has unconventional ideas; maybe he wouldn't mind marrying into
the proletar