raised her head, and even pushed Jerome away, gently, and he loosened
his hold and stood up before her, all pale and trembling.

"You must forgive me--I--forgot myself," he said, with quick gasps
for breath, "I won't--sit--down there again." Then he went on,
speaking fast: "I have been--wanting to tell you, but there was no
chance. I could not come to see you any longer. I could not. I
thought a man could go to see a woman when he was in love with her,
and could bear it when the love was all on his side, and there was
no--chance of marriage. I thought I could bear it if it pleased you,
but--I didn't know it would be like this. I was never in love, and I
did not know. I could think of nothing but wanting you. It was
spoiling me for everything else, and there are other things in the
world besides this. If I came much longer I should not be fit to
come. I _could_ not come any longer." Jerome looked down at Lucina,
with an air of stern, yet wistful, argument. She sat before him with
downcast, pale, and sober face, then she rose, and all her girlish
irresolution and shame dropped from her, and left for a moment the
woman in her unveiled.

"I love you as much as you love me," she said, simply.

Jerome looked at her. "You--don't mean--that?"

"Yes, I suppose I did when you told me first, but I did not know it
then. Now I know it. I have been very unhappy because I feared you
might be staying away because you thought I did not love you, but I
dared not try to see you as I did before, because I had found myself
out. To-day I could not help it, whatever you might think of me, or
whatever I might think of myself. I could not bear to worry any
longer, lest you might be unhappy because you thought I did not love
you. I do, and you need not stay away any more for that."

"Lucina--you don't mean--"

"Do you think I would have let you--do as you did a minute ago, if I
had not?" said she, and a blush spread over her face and neck.

"I--thought--it was all--me--that--_you_--did not--"

"No, I let you," whispered Lucina.

"Oh, you don't mean that you--like me this same way that I do
you--enough to marry me! You don't mean that?"

"Yes, I do," replied Lucina; she looked up at him with a curious
solemn steadfastness. She was not blushing any more.

"I--never thought of this," Jerome said, drawing a long, sobbing
breath. He stood looking at her, his face all white and working.
"Lucina," he began, then paused, for he could not