And when he did see her again, he gave not the smallest sign of what had happened, so that she almost grew to feel that she must have dreamt it.

That same afternoon, Jim Urquhart, who was always doing so, rode over to Redford to see if he could help her pack.  He wondered at her abstracted manner, and her sudden change of mind concerning the piano and wardrobe and other things.  Having laboriously packed books and pictures, she now proposed to unpack half of them.  She wanted to see what room she would have in her cottage first.  In fact, it seemed to him that she did not know what she wanted.  She was evidently tired and overwrought.  “Oh, Jim,” she moaned, from amongst the dust and litter, “it is a wrench!”

“What do you suppose it is for us?” he returned gloomily.  “Without you at Redford!  I’m trying not to think of it.”

“So am I. But it’s no use—­it has got to come.”

“I suppose there is no way out?”

“None.  That is all settled.  I have told Mr Thornycroft, and he won’t tease me any more.”

“Do you think you will be happy down there, cooped up in streets?”

“I know I shall not.  But the streets down there will be better than the streets of a bush township.”

“Why streets at all?  Why not stay about here somewhere, where you have us all near you?”

“Exiled from Redford?  No, thank you.  Besides, where could we stay?  Detached cottages don’t grow in these parts.”

Then he blurted it out.

“I have never said anything, Deb.  I knew I wasn’t fit for you, and.  I am not now.  I’ve got to look after my dear old mother and the children, who haven’t got anybody else, and I couldn’t give you a home worthy of you—­perhaps never, no matter how I worked and tried; but if love is any good, and the things that after all make homes—­not money and fine furniture—­” “Dear old boy, don’t!” she pleaded, with twitching lips.

“I may as well, now I have begun,” said he.  “I don’t suppose it is any use, but I’d just like you to know once—­as far as my life is my own, it is yours any day you like.  It has been since I was a boy, and it will be for a good while yet—­I won’t say for ever, because you can’t tell what’s going to happen; but I’m ready to bet my soul that it will be for ever.  Now, do just what you feel inclined to, Debbie.  I’m not going to press you—­I know my place too well; but if you should think it a better plan to live with me, and have me work for you and take care of you the best I can, why, any heaven that’s coming to us by-and-by simply won’t be in it—­not for me.”  He looked at her across the packing-case between them, and dropped his voice to add:  “But you wouldn’t, of course.”

“I would, dear Jim!” she cried, with warm impulsiveness; “that is, I might.  A good man like you is worth a worldful of money and furniture.  I don’t live for those things, as you seem to think; but—­but you know how it is—­I can’t change about from one to another—­”