I look at him, and our eyes meet. He always was a pale young man--no bucolic beef-and-beer ruddiness about him--always of a healthy swart pallor; but now he is deadly white!--so, by-the-by, I fancy am I! His dark eyes burn with a shamed yet eager glow. With the words and tones of our last parting ringing in our ears, we both feel that it would be useless affectation to attempt to meet as ordinary acquaintance. "No," say I, faintly, almost in a whisper, "it--it does not matter! only that I did not know that you were to be here!" "No more did I, until this morning!" he answers, eagerly; "this morning--at the last moment--young Parker asked me to come down with him--and I--I knew we must meet sooner or later--that it could not be put off forever, and so I thought we might as well get over it here as anywhere else!" Neither of us has thought of sitting down. He is speaking with rapid, low emotion, and I stand stupidly listening. "I suppose so," I answer lazily. I cannot for the life of me help it, friends. I am back in Brindley Wood. He has come a few steps nearer me. His voice is always low, but now it is almost a whisper in which he is so rapidly, pantingly speaking. "I shall most likely not have another opportunity, probably we shall not be alone again, and I _must_ hear, I _must_ know--have you forgiven me?" As he speaks, the recollection of all the ill he has done me, of my lost self-respect, my alienated Roger, my faded life, pass before my mind. "_That_ I have not!" reply I, looking full at him, and speaking with a distinct and heavy emphasis of resentment and aversion, "and, by God's help, I never will!" "You will _not_!" he cries, starting back with an expression of the utmost anger and discomfiture. "You will _not_! you will carry vengeance for one mad minute through a whole life! It is _impossible! impossible!_ if _you_ are so unforgiving, how do you expect God to forgive you your sins?" I shrug my shoulders with a sort of despairing contempt. God has seemed to me but dim of late. "He may forgive them or leave them unforgiven as He sees best; but--_I will never forgive you!_" "What!" he cries, his face growing even more ash-white than it was before, and his voice quivering with a passionate anger; "not for _Barbara's_ sake?" I shudder. I hate to hear him pronounce her name. "No," say I, steadily, "not for Barbara's sake!" "You will have to," he cries violently; "it is nonsense! think of the close connection, of the _relationship_ that there will be between us! think of the remarks you will excite! you will defeat your own object!" "I will excite no remark!" I reply resolutely. "I will be quite civil to you! I will say 'good-morning' and 'good-evening' to you; if you ask me a question I will answer it; but--I will _never_ forgive you!"