"But I am looking at you in a different light," she said. He seemed to think that she was laughing at him, or that she had not taken him seriously. A deep flush mounted his sun-burnt cheeks. "Nora, I am very much in earnest," he said, his grasp on her hand tightening. "Though you are a child you must have felt long ago that I cared for you as something more than my little comrade. I love you, and I have loved you a long time. Will you be my wife?" She shook her head gravely and regretfully. "I can’t." "Why not?" "Because I do not love you." "Are you sure? How can you tell? You know nothing of love." "No," she agreed. "That is the very reason I will not marry you." He let her hand go and stood looking at her with his lips tightly compressed, as though on a storm of protest. "Would you mind if I was quite honest?" she went on. "I would rather tell you everything, even if it makes you think me bad and heartless." "I shall never think that of you," he said painfully. "Well, then, I did know you cared for me," she continued. "I was always ashamed of myself for knowing. It seemed conceited of me to imagine that a grown-up man should want such a child as I am—still, I couldn’t help it. I felt it. It seems one does feel that sort of thing. It is like electricity in the air. Anyhow, it did not worry me very much. I made up my mind that one of these days I would marry you. It seemed so probable and natural that I should. We had known each other since I was a baby and you a school-boy; our families were connected; we lived in the same neighbourhood; we saw each other at regular intervals; we never quarrelled—or hardly ever; we knew each other’s faults better than most people do who marry. Everything seemed to point in the same direction. But I was such a school-girl. I felt that there was heaps of time for me to grow to love you—or perhaps find out that I loved you already. You see, I wasn’t sure. I liked to be with you; but then, I like to be with any one who is jolly and amusing, so that wasn’t a sure test. Yesterday I knew that there was no time left me. I guessed that I should have to decide between you and Karlsburg. It sounds horrid, but it is the truth. And I could not decide—I simply could not. Then I thought—perhaps if you _asked_ me, perhaps if you told me about _your_ love, it would awaken some sort of an answer in me—I should feel some sort of signal such as I should imagine a woman would feel if the being with whom she is destined to spend her life, and perhaps more, stood at her side and held her hand. So I came out here, so that you would ask me to be your wife. Are you angry?" He shook his head, frowning straight before him. "No."