y doubtful of
assent--

"You love me, Sylvia?"

"No."

Only half audible was the reluctant answer, yet he heard it, smiled at
what he fancied a shy falsehood, and said tenderly--

"Will you let me love you, dear?"

"No."

Fainter than before was the one word, but it reached and startled him.
Hurriedly he asked--

"Am I nothing to you but a friend?"

"No."

With a quick gesture he put down her hands and looked at her. Grief,
regret, and pity, filled her face with trouble, but no love was there.
He saw, yet would not believe the truth, felt that the sweet certainty
of love had gone, yet could not relinquish the fond hope.

"Sylvia, do you understand me?"

"I do, I do! but I cannot say what you would have me, and I must tell
the truth, although it breaks my heart. Geoffrey, I do not love you."

"Can I not teach you?" he pleaded eagerly.

"I have no desire to learn."

Softly she spoke, remorseful she looked, but the words wounded like a
blow. All the glad assurance died, the passionate glow faded, the
caress, half tender, half timid, fell away, and nothing of the happy
lover remained in face or figure. He rose slowly as if the heavy
disappointment oppressed both soul and body. He fixed on her a glance of
mingled incredulity, reproach, and pain, and said, like one bent on
ending suspense at once--

"Did you not see that I loved you? Can you have been trifling with me?
Sylvia, I thought you too simple and sincere for heartless coquetry."

"I am! You shall not suspect me of that, though I deserve all other
reproaches. I have been very selfish, very blind. I should have
remembered that in your great kindness you might like me too well for
your own peace. I should have believed Mark, and been less candid in my
expressions of esteem. But I wanted a friend so much; I found all I
could ask in you; I thought my youth, my faults, my follies, would make
it impossible for you to see in me anything but a wayward girl, who
frankly showed her regard, and was proud of yours. It was one of my sad
mistakes; I see it now; and now it is too late for anything but
penitence. Forgive me if you can; I've taken all the pleasure, and left
you all the pain."

Sylvia spoke in a paroxysm of remorseful sorrow. Moor listened with a
sinking heart, and when she dropped her face into her hands again,
unable to endure the pale expectancy of his, he turned away, saying with
an accent of quiet despair--

"Then I have worked and waited