But the poor fellow was so conscious of his own coming trouble that tears came into his eyes, and after Mrs. Jocelyn had gone he looked at Mildred in a way that made her ask, gently and anxiously: 

“What is it, Roger?”

Alter a moment’s hesitation he said grimly, “Millie, it’s rough on a fellow when he must be his own executioner.  There, take it.  It’s the heaviest load I ever carried in my life,” and he threw the letter into her lap.

After a moment’s glance she trembled violently, and became pale and red by turns, then buried her face in her hands.

“I knew it would be so,” he said doggedly.  “I knew what was the matter all along.”

She sprang up, letting the letter drop on the floor, and clung to him.  “Roger,” she cried, “I won’t read the letter.  I won’t touch it.  No one shall come between us—­no one has the right.  Oh, it would be shameful after all—­”

“Millie,” he said almost sternly, replacing her in her chair, “the writer of that letter has the right to come between us—­he is between us, and there is no use in disguising the truth.  Come, Millie, I came here to play the man, and you must not make it too hard for me.  Read your letter.”

“I can’t,” she said, again burying her burning face in her hands, and giving way to a sudden passion of tears.

“No, not while I’m here, of course.  And yet I’d like to know my fate, for the suspense is a little too much.  I hope he’s written to tell you that he has married the daughter of the Great Mogul, or some other rich nonentity,” he added, trying to meet his disappointment with a faint attempt at humor; “but I’m a fool to hope anything.  Good-by, and read your letter in peace.  I ought to have left it and gone away at once, but, confound it!  I couldn’t.  A drowning man will blindly catch at a straw.”

She looked at him, and saw that his face was white with pain and fear.

“Roger,” she said resolutely, “I’ll burn that letter without opening it if you say so.  I’ll do anything you ask.”

He paced the room excitedly with clenched hands for a few moments, but at last turned toward her and said quietly, “Will you do what I ask?”

“Yes, yes indeed.”

“Then read your letter.”

She looked at him irresolutely a moment, then made a little gesture of protest and snatched up the missive almost vindictively.

After reading a few lines her face softened, and she said, in accents of regret which she was too much off her guard to disguise, “Oh, he never received my answer last summer.”

“Of course not,” growled Roger.  “You deserved that, for you gave your note to that old blunderbuss Jotham, when I would have carried it safely.”

“Oh, Roger, I can’t go on with this; I am wronging you too shamefully.”

“You would wrong me far more if you were not honest with me at this time,” he said almost harshly.

His words quieted and chilled her a little, and she replied sadly, “You are right, Roger.  You don’t want, nor should I mock you with the mere semblance of what you give.”