“Wouldn’t it be better to try?” he said softly.

“No, I don’t think so.”

St. George released her hand and settled back in his chair; his face grew grave.  What manner of woman was this, and how could he reach the inner kernel of her heart?  Again he raised his head and leaning forward took both her hands between his own.

“I am going to tell you a story, Kate—­one you have never heard—­not all of it.  When I was about your age—­a little older perhaps, I gave my heart to a woman who had known me from a boy; with whom I had played when she was a child.  I’m not going into the whole story, such things are always sad; nor will I tell you anything of the beginning of the three happy months of our betrothal nor of what caused our separation.  I shall only tell you of the cruelty of the end.  There was a misunderstanding—­a quarrel—­I begging her forgiveness on my knees.  All the time her heart was breaking.  One little word from her would have healed everything.  Some years after that she married and her life still goes on.  I am what you see.”

Kate looked at him with swimming eyes.  She dimly remembered that she had heard that her uncle had had a love affair in his youth and that his sweetheart had jilted him for a richer man, but she had never known that he had suffered so bitterly over it.  Her heart went out to him all the more.

“Will you tell me who it was?” She had no right to ask; but she might comfort him the better if she knew.

“Harry’s mother.”

Kate dropped his hands and drew back in her seat.

“You—­loved—­Mrs.—­Rutter—­and she—­refused you for—­Oh!—­what a cruel thing to do!  And what a fool she was.  Now I know why you have been so good to Harry.  Oh, you poor, dear Uncle George.  Oh, to think that you of all men!  Is there any one whose heart is not bruised and broken?” she added in a helpless tone.

“Plenty of them, Kate—­especially those who have been willing to stoop a little and so triumph.  Harry has waited three years for some word from you; he has not asked for it, for he believes you have forgotten him; and then he was too much of a man to encroach upon another’s rights.  Does your breaking off with Mr. Willits alter the case in any way?—­does it make any difference?  Is this sailor boy always to be a wanderer —­never to come home to his people and the woman he loves?”

“He’ll never come back to me, Uncle George,” she said with a shudder, dropping her eyes.  “I found that out the day we talked together in the park, just before he left.  And he’s not coming home.  Father got a letter from one of his agents who had seen him.  He was looking very well and was going up into the mountains—­I wrote you about it.  I am sorry you didn’t get the letter—­but of course he has written you too.”

“Suppose I should tell you that he would come back if he thought you would be glad to see him—­glad in the old way?”