“Let’s pull ourselves together and talk sense, Geraldine,” he said with an effort at lightness.

“Don’t you remember that bully little girl who swung her fists in single combat and uppercut her brother and me whenever her sense of fairness was outraged?  The time has come when you, who were so fair to others, are going to be fair to yourself by marrying me——­”

She dropped both hands and stared at him out of wide, tear-wet eyes.

“Fair to myself—­at your expense, Duane?”

“What do you mean?  I love you.”

“Am I to let you—­you marry me—­knowing—­what you know?  Is that what you call my sense of fairness?” And, as he attempted to speak: 

“Oh, I have thought about it already!—­I must have been conscious that this would happen some day—­that—­that I was capable of caring for you—­and it alarmed me——­”

“Are you capable of loving me?”

“Duane, you must not ask me that!”

“Tell me!”

But she pushed him back, and they faced each other, her hands remaining on his shoulders.  She strove piteously to endure his gaze, flinched, strove to push him from her again—­but the slender hands lay limply against him.  So they remained, her hands at intervals nervously tightening and relaxing on his shoulders, her tearful breath coming faster, the dark eyes closing, opening, turning from him, toward him, searching, now in his soul, now in her own, her self-command slipping from her.

“It is cowardly in me—­if I do it,” she said in the ghost of a voice.

“Do what?”

“Let you risk—­what I m-might become.”

“You little saint!”

“Some saints were depraved at first—­weren’t they?” she said without a smile.  “Oh, Duane, Duane, to think I could ever be here speaking to you about—­about the horror that has happened to me—­looking into your face and giving up my dreadful secret to you—­laying my very soul naked before you!  How can I look at you——­”

“Because I love you.  Now give me the right to your lips and heart!”

There was a long silence.  Then she tried to smile.

“My—­my lips?  I—­thought you took such things—­lightly——­”

She hesitated, glanced up at him, then began to tremble.

“Duane—­if you are in earnest about our—­about an engagement—­promise me that I may be released if I—­think best——­”

“Why?”

“I—­I might fail——­”

“The more need of me.  But you can’t fail——­”

“Yes, but if I should, dear.  Will you release me?  I cannot—­I will not engage myself to you—­unless you promise to let me go if I think it best.  You know what my word means.  Give it back to me if matters go wrong with me.  Will you?”

“But I am going to marry you now!” he said with a short, excited laugh.

“Now!” she repeated, appalled.

“Certainly, to make sure of you.  We don’t need a license in this State.  There’s a parson at West Gate Village....  I intend to make sure of you now.  You can keep it a secret if you like.  When you return to town we can have everything en regle—­engagement announced, cards, church wedding, and all that.  Meanwhile I’m going to be sure of you.”