Part 8 (1/2)
He laid his hand upon hers. She blushed deeply and lowered her head.
A tear dropped upon the front of her gown and hung glittering in the meshes of the white lace. She crept into his arms and buried her face upon his shoulder and sobbed. He had never seen her even look like tears before.
”We must be married,” he repeated, patting her on the shoulder.
She shook her head in negation.
”Yes,” he said firmly, mentally noting that this was the very first time he had ever caught her in a pretense.
”No.” Her tone was as firm as his. She lifted her head and put her cheek against his. ”It makes me very proud that you ask it. But--I--I do not----”
”Do not--what?”
”I do not want--I will not--risk losing you.”
”But you won't lose me. You will have me more than ever.”
”Some men--yes. But not you.”
”And why not I, O Wisdom?”
”Because--because--do you think I have watched you all this time, without learning something about you? The way to keep you is to leave you free. I do not want your name. I do not want your friends I do not want to be respectable. I want--just you.”
”But are we not as good as married now?”
”Yes--that's it. And I want it to keep on. I never cared for anybody until I saw you. I shall never care for anybody else. I never shall try.
I want you as long as I can have you. And then----”
”And then,” Howard laughed or rather, pretended to laugh, ”and then, 'Oh, dig me a grave both wide and deep, wide and deep.' How like twenty-years-old that is.”
She seemed not to hear his jest and presently went on: ”Do you remember the evening before I left, down there at Mrs. Sands's?”
”The night you proposed to me?” Howard said, pulling her ear.
She smiled faintly and continued: ”I thought it all out that night. I intended to come back just as I did. I went deliberately. I----”
Howard put his hand over her lips.
”O, I am not going to tell anything,”, said she, evading his fingers.
”Only this--that I understood you then, understood just why you would never marry. Not so clearly as I understand it now, but still I--understood. And you have been teaching me ever since, teaching me manners, teaching me how to read and think and talk. And more than all, you've taught me your way of looking at life.”
Howard held her away from him and studied her face, surprise in his eyes. ”Isn't it strange?” he said.
”Here I've been seeing you day after day all this time, have had a chance to know you better than I ever knew any one in my life, have had you very near to me day and night. And just now, as I look at you, I see the real you for the first time in two years.”
”I have been wondering when you would look at me again,” said Alice with a small, sly smile.
”Why, you are a woman grown. Where is the little girl I knew, the little girl who used to look up to me?”