questions clamored at the door of his heart. But one thing could he see clearly. He must wait without the wall, seeking only to serve and protect her.
With the unerring instinct which led her always straight to the mark, she had seen the only right course. He repeated her words over and over to himself. "If you love me, you must never know it, and I must never know it." Her heart should be sacred from his personal intrusion, and their old relations must be reëstablished, at whatever cost to himself.
With flash-light clearness he saw his difficulty, and that only by the elimination of self could he serve her, and also that her manner of receiving his revelation had but intensified his feeling for her. The few short moments seemed hours of struggle with himself ere he raised her to her feet and spoke quietly, in his old way.
He lifted her hand to his lips. "It is past, Miss Cassandra. We will drop these few moments out of your life into a deep well, and it shall be as if they had never been." He thought as he spoke that the well was his own heart, but that he would not say, for henceforth his love and service must be selfless. "We may be good friends still? Just as we were?"
"Yes, suh," she spoke meekly.
"And we can go right on helping each other, as we have done all these weeks? I do not need to leave you?"
"Oh, no, no!" She spoke with a gasp of dismay at the thought.