His throat is still too dry for him to speak; but he stretches out his arm to encircle her in a mute protest at that thanksgiving over her own shipwreck; but, for the first time in her life, she eludes his caress. "Child-stealing," she repeats, under her breath; "and yet"--with a touching impulse of apology and deprecation--"you seemed old for your age; you seemed so much in earnest; I think you really were;"--a wistful pause--"and afterwards, though of course I could not help seeing that I was not to you what you were to me, yet I thought--I hoped that if I waited--if I was patient--if no one else--no one more worthy of you came between us"--another and still wistfuller delay in her halting speech--"you might grow a little fond of me, out of long habit; I never expected you to be more than a little fond of me!" He has entirely hidden his face in his two hands, so that she is without that index to guide her as to the effect produced by her words, and he continues completely silent. Whether, even after her rude awakening, she still, deep in her heart, cherishes some pale hope of a denial, an explaining away of the reported utterances, who shall say? It is with a half-choked sigh that she goes on: "But you could not; I am not so unjust as not to know that you tried your best. Poor fellow! it must have been uphill work for you"--with a first touch of bitterness--"_labouring_ to love me, for eight years; is it any wonder that you failed? and I was so thick-skinned I did not see it--the '_hide of a hippopotamus_' indeed! There could not be a juster comparison; and now all I can do is to beg your pardon for having spoilt eight of your best years--_your best years_"--with slow iteration; "but come"--more lightly--"you have some very good ones left too; you are still quite young; for a man you are quite young; the harm I have done you is not irreparable; I think"--with an accent of reproach--"you might ease my mind by telling me that the harm I have done you is not irreparable!" Thus appealed to, it is impossible for him any longer to maintain his attitude of disguise and concealment. His hands must needs be withdrawn from before his face; and, as he turns that face towards her, she perceives with astonishment, almost consternation, that there is an undoubted tear in each of his hard gray eyes. "And what about the harm I have done to you?" he asks under his breath, as if having no confidence in his voice; "what about the eight best years of _your_ life?" A look of affection, so high and tender and selfless, as to seem to remove her love out of the category of the mortal and the transitory, dawns and grows in her wan face. "Do not fret about them," she answers soothingly, "they were--they always will have been--the eight best years of my life. They were full of good and pleasant things. Do not forget--I would not for worlds have you forget--I shall never forget myself--that they all came to me through you!"