d Warwick had he laid dying.

"On that September evening, as I sat alone, I had been thinking of what
might be and what must be. Had decided that I would go away for
Geoffrey's sake. He was fitter than I to have you, being so gentle, and
in all ways ready to possess a wife. I was so rough, such a vagrant, so
full of my own purposes and plans, how could I dare to take into my
keeping such a tender little creature as yourself? I thought you did not
care for me; I knew any knowledge of my love would only mar his own; so
it was best to go at once and leave him to the happiness he so well
deserved. Just then you came to me, as if the wind had blown my desire
to my arms. Such a loving touch that was! it nearly melted my resolve,
it seemed hard not to take the one thing I wanted, when it came to me so
opportunely. I yearned to break that idle promise, made when I was vain
in my own conceit, and justly punished for its folly; but you said keep
it, and I did. You could not understand my trouble, and when I sat
before you so still, perhaps looking grim and cold, you did not know how
I was wrestling with my unruly self. I am not truly generous, for the
relinquishment of any cherished object always costs a battle, and I too
often find I am worsted. For the first time I dared not meet your eyes
till you dived into mine with that expression wistful and guileless,
which has often made me feel as if we stood divested of our bodies, soul
to soul.

"Tongue I could control, heart I could not. Up it sprung stronger than
will, swifter than thought, and answered you. Sylvia, had there been one
ray of self-consciousness in those steady eyes of yours, one atom of
maiden shame, or fear, or trouble, I should have claimed you as my own.
There was not; and though you let me read your face like an open book,
you never dreamed what eloquence was in it. Innocent heart, that loved
and had not learned to know it. I saw this instantly, saw that a few
more such encounters would show it to you likewise, and felt more
strongly than before that if ever the just deed to you, the generous one
to Geoffrey were done, it should be then. For that was the one moment
when your half-awakened heart could fall painlessly asleep again, if I
did not disturb it, and dream on till Geoffrey woke it, to find a
gentler master than I could be to it."

"It could not, Adam; you had wholly roused it, and it cried for you so
long, so bitterly, oh, why did you not come to answer