Mr. Trelyon,
don't ask me to tell you why this should be so. I know it to be
right: my heart tells me. Now I will say good-bye to you."
"And when I come back to the inn, will you be there?" said he,
becoming rather pale. "No: you will be married to a man whom you will
hate."
"Indeed, no," she said, with her face flushing and her eyes cast down.
"How can that be after what has taken place? He could not ask me. All
that I begged of him before he went away was this--that he would not
ask me to marry him; and if only he would do that I promised never to
see you again--after bidding you good-bye, as I do now."
"And is that the arrangement?" said he rather roughly. "Are we to play
at dog in the manger? He is not to marry you himself, but he will not
let any other man marry you?"
"Surely he has some right to consideration," she said.
"Well, Wenna," said he, "if you've made up your mind, there's no more
to be said; but I think you are needlessly cruel."
"You won't say that, just as we are parting," she said in a low voice.
"Do you think it is nothing to me?"
He looked at her for a moment with a great sadness and compunction in
his eyes; then, moved by an uncontrollable impulse, he caught her in
his arms and kissed her on the lips.
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