He fell back from the bench with a sharp exclamation, and stared at her
through the gray twilight. She went on hurriedly, again not looking at
him: "When you showed me that you cared for me--when you told me that you did--
I--do you think I wanted to care for you? I wanted to do something to show
you that I could be ashamed of my vile neglect of him--something to show
you his daughter could be grateful. If I had loved you, what I did would
have been for that--and I could not have done it. And how could I have
shown my gratitude if I had done it for love? And it has been such dear,
happy work, the little I have done, that it seems, after all, that I have
done it for love of myself. But--but when you first told me--" She broke
off with a strange, fluttering, half inarticulate little laugh that was
half tears; and then resumed in another tone: "When you told me you cared
that night--that night we were here--how could I be sure? It had been only
two days, you see, and even if I could have been sure of myself, why, I
couldn't have told you. Oh! I had so brazenly thrown myself at your head,
time and again, those two days, in my--my worship of your goodness to my
father and my excitement in recognizing in his friend the hero of my
girlhood, that you had every right to think I cared; but if--but if I had
--if I had--loved you with my whole soul, I could not have--why, no woman
could have--I mean the sort of girl I am couldn't have admitted it--must
have denied it. And what I was trying to do for you when we met in Rouen
was--was courting you. You surely see I couldn't have done it if I had
cared. It would have been brazen! And do you think that then I could have
answered--'Yes'--even if I wanted to--even if I had been sure of myself?
And now--" Her voice sank again to a whisper. "And now----"
From the meadows across the creek, and over the fields, came a far
tinkling of farm-bells. Three months ago, at this hour, John Harkless had
listened to that sound, and its great lonesomeness had touched his heart
like a cold hand; but now, as the mists were rising from the water and the
small stars pierced the sky one by one, glinting down through the dim,
immeasurable blue distances, he found no loneliness in heaven or earth. He
leaned forward toward her; the bench was between them. The last light was
gone; evening had fallen.