And yet he could not leave her, desert her—­yes, that was the word!—­without making some sign, without speaking one word, not of excuse, but of farewell.  What could he say to her?  He could not tell her the truth; for his father’s sake that must never be divulged; he could give her no explanation, must permit her to think him base and faithless and dishonorable.  There was only one thing he could do, and that was to write to her.  But what could he say?

He went to his writing-table and took up a pen.  His hand was cold as ice and shaking, and he held it before him until it grew steadier.  At the best of times, Stafford was not much of a letter-writer; one does not learn the epistolatory art either at public schools or the ’varsities, and hitherto Stafford’s letter-writing had been confined to the sending or accepting of invitations, a short note about some meet, or horse dealing.  How was he to address her?  She was his dearest still, the only woman in the world he had loved or ever would love, but he dared not call her so, dared not tell her so.  He wrote her name, but the sweet word seemed to look up at him reproachfully, accusingly; and though he had written only that name, he tore up several sheets of paper, and at last, in desperation, scarcely knowing what he was writing, he wrote, quickly, hurriedly and without pausing, the following lines: 

“I am writing this because you made me promise that if anything happened, let it be what it might, to separate us, I would not come and tell you.  Something has happened.  I have discovered that I am not only unworthy of calling you mine as any man in the world, even the best, would be, but that I am unworthy in the sense that would justify you in the eyes of your father, of everybody belonging to you, in sending me adrift.  If I could tell you what it is you would understand and see how great a gulf yawns between us.  You would not marry me, I can never be anything to you but a painful memory.  Though you know how much I loved you, you will never guess what it costs me to relinquish all claim to you, to tear myself away from you.  But I must do so—­and forever.  There is no hope, none whatever, for me.  I do not ask you to forgive me—­if I had known what I know now I would rather have died than have told you that I loved you, but I do ask you to forget me; or, if you remember me, to think of me as the most wretched and ill-fated of men; as one who is bound hand and foot, and compelled, driven, along a path against his will.  I dare not say any more, dare not tell you what this sacrifice costs me.  Whether you forget or remember me, I shall never forget you for a single instant, shall never cease to look back upon my lost happiness, as a man looks back upon a lost heaven.

“STAFFORD.”

He read it over a dozen—­twenty times, and every time it seemed weaker, meaner, less inexplicable; but he knew that if he destroyed it he could write nothing better, nothing that could satisfy him, though it seemed to him that his heart would have expressed itself more fully it he had written only, “Good-bye!  Forget me!”