“Dear Freckles,” she said, “there is a story in your eyes this morning, tell me?”

Freckles drew a long, wavering breath.

“Angel,” he begged, “be generous!  Be thinking of me a little.  I’m so homesick and worn out, dear Angel, be giving me back me promise.  Let me go?”

“Why Freckles!” faltered the Angel.  “You don’t know what you are asking.  ‘Let you go!’ I cannot!  I love you better than anyone, Freckles.  I think you are the very finest person I ever knew.  I have our lives all planned.  I want you to be educated and learn all there is to know about singing, just as soon as you are well enough.  By the time you have completed your education I will have finished college, and then I want,” she choked a second, “I want you to be my real knight, Freckles, and come to me and tell me that you—­like me—­a little.  I have been counting on you for my sweetheart from the very first, Freckles.  I can’t give you up, unless you don’t like me.  But you do like me—­just a little—­don’t you, Freckles?”

Freckles lay whiter than the coverlet, his staring eyes on the ceiling and his breath wheezing between dry lips.  The Angel awaited his answer a second, and when none came, she dropped her crimsoning face beside him on the pillow and whispered in his ear: 

“Freckles, I—­I’m trying to make love to you.  Oh, can’t you help me only a little bit?  It’s awful hard all alone!  I don’t know how, when I really mean it, but Freckles, I love you.  I must have you, and now I guess—­I guess maybe I’d better kiss you next.”

She lifted her shamed face and bravely laid her feverish, quivering lips on his.  Her breath, like clover-bloom, was in his nostrils, and her hair touched his face.  Then she looked into his eyes with reproach.

“Freckles,” she panted, “Freckles!  I didn’t think it was in you to be mean!”

“Mean, Angel!  Mean to you?” gasped Freckles.

“Yes,” said the Angel.  “Downright mean.  When I kiss you, if you had any mercy at all you’d kiss back, just a little bit.”

Freckles’ sinewy fist knotted into the coverlet.  His chin pointed ceilingward while his head rocked on the pillow.

“Oh, Jesus!” burst from him in agony.  “You ain’t the only one that was crucified!”

The Angel caught Freckles’ hand and carried it to her breast.

“Freckles!” she wailed in terror, “Freckles!  It is a mistake?  Is it that you don’t want me?”

Freckles’ head rolled on in wordless suffering.

“Wait a bit, Angel?” he panted at last.  “Be giving me a little time!”

The Angel arose with controlled features.  She bathed his face, straightened his hair, and held water to his lips.  It seemed a long time before he reached toward her.  Instantly she knelt again, carried his hand to her breast, and leaned her cheek upon it.

“Tell me, Freckles,” she whispered softly.