come"--he paused, and snapped the finger and thumb that
hung quiescent at his side--"well and good. I shall have lived. I shall
have known what life is meant to be. I shall have been the happiest man
in the world."

He spoke slowly in his gently abrupt way. Practice in a difficult
profession had taught him to weigh every word he uttered. He had never
been known to say more than he meant.

"There never has been anybody else," he continued. "All that side of
life was quite blank. The world was empty until you came and filled it,
at Lady Orlay's that afternoon. I had come half round the world--you had
come across Europe. And fate had fixed that I should meet you there.
At first I did not believe. I thought it was a mistake--that we should
drift apart again. Then came my orders to leave for Warsaw. I knew then
that you would inevitably return. Still I tried to get out of it--fought
against it--tried to avoid you. And you knew what it all came to."

She nodded again, and still did not meet his eyes. She had not spoken to
him since he entered the room.

"There never can be anybody else," he said. "How could there be?"

And the abrupt laugh that followed the question made her catch her
breath. She had, then, the knowledge given to so few, that so far as
this one fellow-creature was concerned she was the whole earth--that
he was thrusting upon her the greatest responsibility that the soul can
carry. For to love is as difficult as it is rare, but to be worthy of
love is infinitely harder.

"I knew from the first," he continued, "that there is no hope. Whichever
way we turn there is no hope. I can spare you the task of telling me
that."

She turned her eyes to his at last.

"You knew?" she asked, speaking for the first time.

"I know the history of Poland," he said, quietly. "The country must
have your father--your father needs you. I could not ask you to give up
Poland--you know that."

They stood in silence for a few moments. They had had so little time
together that they must needs have learned to understand each other in
absence. The friendship that grows in absence and the love that comes to
life between two people who are apart, are the love and friendship which
raise men to such heights as human nature is permitted to attain.

"If you asked me," said Wanda, at length, with an illegible smile--"I
should do it."

"And if I asked you I should not love you. If you loved me, you would
one day cease to do so; for