“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 you would remember what I had asked you.  There would be a sort of flaw, and you would discover it—­and that would be the end.”

“Is it so delicate as that?” she asked.

“It is the frailest thing in the world—­and the strongest,” he answered, with his thoughtful smile.  “It is a very delicate sort of—­thought, which is given to two people to take care of.  And they never seem to succeed in keeping it even passably intact—­and not one couple in a million carry it through life unhurt.  And the injuries never come from the outer world, but from themselves.”

“Where did you learn all that?” she asked, looking at him with her shrewd, smiling eyes.

“You taught me.”

“But you have a terribly high ideal.”

“Yes.”

“Are you sure you do not expect the impossible?”

“Quite.”

She shook her head doubtfully.

“Are you sure you will never have to compromise?  All the world compromises.”

“With its conscience,” said Cartoner.  “And look at the result.”

“Then you are good,” she returned, looking at him with a speculative gravity, “as well as concise—­and rather masterful.”

“It is clear,” he said, “that a man who persuades a woman to marry against her inclination, or her conviction, or her conscience, is seeking her unhappiness and his own.”

“Ah!” she cried.  “But you ask for a great deal.”

“I ask for love.”

“And,” she said, going past that question, “no obstacles.”