All these excited thoughts passed through his brain with lightning-like swiftness, but now, at last, the silence was broken by a sound. It was a very gentle one--a short, faint sigh from Margaret; but its effect was powerful. It roused the young man from his absorption and recalled him to reality. He sat down a little space away from her, and with his fervid eyes fixed on her pale profile and lowered lids, began to speak. “It was an impulse, not a deliberate purpose, that made me call you back,” he said. “I should perhaps have done better to let you go, but I did not, and now you are here, and I am here, and we are alone in the stillness together, Margaret, and you will have to listen to what I have to say. I think you must know what it is. My efforts to keep the truth out of my eyes when I looked at you, and out of my voice when I spoke to you, have seemed to me miserable failures many a time, and I dare say you have known it all along.” He paused a moment, still looking at her. There was not a quiver in the still face pressed against the cushions, but at his last words the beautiful arm was uplifted and laid against her cheek, hiding her face from view, as the slim hand closed upon the top of the chair, above her head. It was an attitude full of grace. The white wrap had fallen back, leaving bare the lovely arms and shoulders, and revealing perfectly the symmetry of the rounded figure. Although the face was hidden, he could see every exquisite line and tint of it, in his mind’s eye, almost as plainly as he saw, with his actual vision, the soft masses of hair drawn back from the little shell-like ear, and the portion of white cheek and throat which her screening arm did not conceal. In spite of strong repression, the hot blood overflowed the young man’s bounding heart and sent a glow of dark color surging over his face. Something--a little fluttered movement of the breast--revealed to his confused consciousness that Margaret herself was not unmoved. He rose and advanced toward her. “You know it,” he said; “but let me put into words the sweet, despairing truth. I love you, Margaret. Oh, good and beautiful and true and sweet, how could I choose but love you!” He dropped upon his knees before her, and in this low position he could see her lovely, tremulous lips. At something in their expression a sudden little flame of hope shot up in his heart. “Margaret,” he said, in a deep, commanding tone that was almost stern, while all the time his hands were clinched together, so that he touched not so much as the hem of her dress--“Margaret, look at me. Let me see straight into your eyes.”