to prevent our having it?"

She drew back, freeing her hands. Her face, losing its look of appealing
confidence, was suddenly sharpened by distrust.

"You didn't forget to post my letter?"

Darrow stood before her, constrained and ashamed, and ever more keenly
aware that the betrayal of his distress must be a greater offense than
its concealment.

"What an insinuation!" he cried, throwing out his hands with a laugh.

Her face instantly melted to laughter. "Well, then--I WON'T be sorry; I
won't regret anything except that our good time is over!"

The words were so unexpected that they routed all his resolves. If she
had gone on doubting him he could probably have gone on deceiving her;
but her unhesitating acceptance of his word made him hate the part he
was playing. At the same moment a doubt shot up its serpent-head in his
own bosom. Was it not he rather than she who was childishly trustful?
Was she not almost too ready to take his word, and dismiss once for all
the tiresome question of the letter? Considering what her experiences
must have been, such trustfulness seemed open to suspicion. But the
moment his eyes fell on her he was ashamed of the thought, and knew it
for what it really was: another pretext to lessen his own delinquency.

"Why should our good time be over?" he asked. "Why shouldn't it last a
little longer?"

She looked up, her lips parted in surprise; but before she could speak
he went on: "I want you to stay with me--I want you, just for a few
days, to have all the things you've never had. It's not always May
and Paris--why not make the most of them now? You know me--we're not
strangers--why shouldn't you treat me like a friend?"

While he spoke she had drawn away a little, but her hand still lay in
his. She was pale, and her eyes were fixed on him in a gaze in which
there was neither distrust or resentment, but only an ingenuous wonder.
He was extraordinarily touched by her expression.

"Oh, do! You must. Listen: to prove that I'm sincere I'll tell
you...I'll tell you I didn't post your letter...I didn't post it because
I wanted so much to give you a few good hours...and because I couldn't
bear to have you go."

He had the feeling that the words were being uttered in spite of him by
some malicious witness of the scene, and yet that he was not sorry to
have them spoken.

The girl had listened to him in silence. She remained motionless for a
moment after he had ceased to speak; then she sn