so quickly that
her words seemed stopped, and broken like water that tries to run past
scattered stones.

"Don't you? Don't you understand that I love you desperately, that I
can't bear my life because I love you so, and because I see you
drowning? I'm telling you this in spite of myself. But I know now it had
to be. I swear to you, if you'll trust me, if you'll come away with me,
you shan't repent. Let me put you somewhere in a safe and beautiful
place. That's all I ask. I want no more. I shall force myself to want no
more."

"You--love me?" Mary repeated, still in the dream that was made of music
and moonlight, the ripple of the sea and the stirring of something new
in her nature of which all these sweet and beautiful things seemed part.
"Love! I never thought this could happen to me."

Suddenly he caught her hands and held them so that she was forced to
turn and look at him, instead of gazing out at sea and moonlight.

"Does it mean anything to you?" he asked, almost fiercely.

"Oh, a great deal," she answered. "I hardly know how much yet. It is so
wonderful--so new. Yet somehow not new. I must think about it. I
must----"

It was on her lips to say "I must pray about it," but something stopped
her. He was strange to her still, in spite of the miracle that was
happening, and there were some thoughts which must be kept in the heart,
in silence. Perhaps if she had not kept back those words, much of the
future might have been different, for he must have guessed at once that,
if she were sincere, his thoughts of her had been false thoughts.

"Don't stop to think. Promise me now," he cut her short.

The note of insistence in his voice frightened her, and seemed to break
the music of the dream. "I can't promise!" she exclaimed. "I've never
wanted to marry. It never seemed possible. I----"

Something like a groan was forced from him. She broke off, drawing in
her breath sharply. "What is the matter?" she asked. "Are you
suffering?"

"Yes," he said. "I am suffering. It's my fault, for not making you
understand, and yours because you haven't let me believe in you, worship
you as the angel you were meant to be. I don't know what you are, but
whatever you are I love you with all there is of me. Only--what I asked
was--that you'd let me take you out of this life to something better.
Now don't misunderstand in another way! I'd rather die a thousand deaths
than wrong you. I ask nothing from you for myself. When I knew