“I was mistaken,” began Christie, finding this wooing much harder to withstand than the other.

“No, you were right:  I felt it then and resented it, but I owned it later, and regretted it more bitterly than I can tell.  I’m not worthy of you; I never shall be:  but I’ve loved you for five years without hope, and I’ll wait five more if in the end you will come to me.  Christie, I need you very much!”

If Mr. Fletcher had gone down upon his knees and poured out the most ardent protestations that ever left a lover’s lips, it would not have touched her as did that last little appeal, uttered with a break in the voice that once was so proud and was so humble now.

“Forgive me!” she cried, looking up at him with real respect in her face, and real remorse smiting her conscience.  “Forgive me!  I have misled you and myself.  I tried to love you:  I was grateful for your regard, touched by your fidelity, and I hoped I might repay it; but I cannot!  I cannot!”

“Why?”

Such a hard question!  She owed him all the truth, yet how could she tell it?  She could not in words, but her face did, for the color rose and burned on cheeks and forehead with painful fervor; her eyes fell, and her lips trembled as if endeavoring to keep down the secret that was escaping against her will.  A moment of silence as Mr. Fletcher searched for the truth and found it; then he said with such sharp pain in his voice that Christie’s heart ached at the sound: 

“I see:  I am too late?”

“Yes.”

“And there is no hope?”

“None.”

“Then there is nothing more for me to say but good-by.  May you be happy.”

“I shall not be;—­I have no hope;—­I only try to be true to you and to myself.  Oh, believe it, and pity me as I do you!”

As the words broke from Christie, she covered up her face, bowed down with the weight of remorse that made her long to atone for what she had done by any self-humiliation.

Mr. Fletcher was at his best at that moment; for real love ennobles the worst and weakest while it lasts:  but he could not resist the temptation that confession offered him.  He tried to be generous, but the genuine virtue was not in him; he did want Christie very much, and the knowledge of a rival in her heart only made her the dearer.

“I’m not content with your pity, sweet as it is:  I want your love, and I believe that I might earn it if you would let me try.  You are all alone, and life is hard to you:  come to me and let me make it happier.  I’ll be satisfied with friendship till you can give me more.”

He said this very tenderly, caressing the bent head while he spoke, and trying to express by tone and gesture how eagerly he longed to receive and cherish what that other man neglected.