"I can"t marry you," she cried. "I can"t give you what you want."
"Do you mean that you can"t care for me? Is that what you"re trying to tell me all the time?"
He moved and she cowered back into her chair.
"I--I _can"t_ tell you."
He had turned from her. He was leaning his arms along the mantelshelf; he had bowed his head on them.
They remained for some minutes so; she cowering back; he with his face hidden from her.
"Do you mind telling me," he said presently, "if there"s anybody else that you----"
"That I care for? No, Robert, there"s no one."
"Are you quite sure? Quite honest. Think."
"Do you mean Wilfrid Marston?"
"Yes."
"I certainly do not care for _him_."
He raised his head at that; but he did not look at her.
"Thank G.o.d!" he said.
"Do you think as badly of him as all that?"
"Don"t ask me what I think of him."
"Would you think badly of me if I"d married him?"
"I--I couldn"t have stood it, Kitty."
"I am not going to marry him."
"You haven"t said yet that you don"t care for me?"
"No. I haven"t."
He turned and stooped over her, compelling her to look at him.
"Say it then," he said.
She drew back her face from his and put up her hands between them. He rose and stood before her and looked down at her. The blue of her eyes had narrowed, the pupils stared at him, black and feverish. Her mouth, which had been tight-shut, was open slightly. A thin flush blurred its edges. Her breath came through, short and sharp.
"You"re ill," he said. "You must go back to bed."
"No," she said. "I"ve got to tell you something."
"If you do I shan"t believe it."
"What won"t you believe?"
"That you don"t care for me. I can"t believe it."
"You"d better, Robert."
"I don"t. There"s something wrong. You must tell me what it is."
"There"s nothing wrong but that. I--I made a mistake."
"You only thought you liked me? Or is it worse than that?"
"It"s worse, far worse."
"I see. You tried to like me, and you couldn"t?"
She was silent.
"Poor child. I"ve been a selfish brute. I might have known you couldn"t.
You"ve hardly known me ten days. But if I wait, Kitty--if I give you time to think?"
"If you give me ten years it would do no good."
"I see," he said; "I see."
He gripped the edge of the mantelpiece with both his hands; his tense arms trembled from the shoulders to the wrists; his hold relaxed. He straightened himself and hid his shaking hands in his coat pockets.
There were tears at the edges of his eyelids, the small, difficult tears that cut their way through the flesh that abhors them.
She saw them.
"Ah, Robert--do you care for me like that?"
"You know how I care for you."
He stopped as he swung away from her, remembering that he had failed in courtesy.
"Thank you," he said, simply, "for telling me the truth."
He reached the door, and she rose and came after him. He shook his head as a sign to her not to follow him. She saw that he was going from her because he was tortured and dumb with suffering and with shame.
Then she knew what she must do. She called to him, she entreated.
"Robert--don"t go. Come back--come back. I can"t bear it."
He came back at that cry.