"You
said: Would I have accepted you if you had asked me?"
"I want to change the tense into the present," he replied.
She met his glance calmly. "You ask me to marry you in spite of what you
told me this afternoon?"
"In spite of it and because of it," he said, drawing up a chair near to
her. "A great crisis has arisen in our lives that must make you forget
other words I spoke this afternoon. Those other words and everything
connected with them I blot out of my memory forever. I want you to do me
an infinite service. If there had been no deep affection between us I
should not dare to ask you. I want you to be my wife, to take me into
your keeping, to trust me as an upright man to devote my life to your
happiness. I swear I'll never give you a moment's cause for regret."
She plucked for a while at her gown. It was a strange wooing. But in her
sweet way she had given him her woman's aftermath of love. It was a
gentle, mellow gift, far removed from the summer blaze of passion, and
it had suffered little harm from the sadness of the day.
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