"No," she said. "That is the kind of thing that is never lived down--at least, not in places like this. I know enough to know that." He knew it too. He knew it better than she did. He got the will slowly out of his pocket and opened it. They looked together at her signature. Roger saw it through tears of rage, and crushed the paper together again into his pocket. "Oh! Annette," he said, with a groan. "Why did you sign it?" "I did it to please Dick," she said. Across the water the church bell called to an early service. Roger looked once more at his little world, grown shadowy and indistinct in a veil of smoke. It seemed as if his happiness were fading and eddying away into thin air with the eddies of blue smoke. "We must part," said Annette. "I am sure you see that." The forget-me-not fell from her bosom, and she let it lie. He looked back at her. He had become very pale. "I see one thing," he said fiercely, "and that is that I can't live without you, and what is more, I don't mean to. If you will marry me, I'll stand the racket about the scandal. Hulver is no good to me without you. My life is no good to me without you. If you won't marry me, I'll marry no one, so help me God. If you won't take me, I shall never have any happiness at all. So now you know!--with your talk of parting." She did not answer. She stooped and picked up the forget-me-not again, and put it back in her bosom. Perhaps she thought that was an answer. "Annette," he said slowly, "do you care for me enough to marry me and live here with me? You as my wife and Hulver as my home are the two things I want. But that is all very well for me. The scandal will fall worst on you. If I can stand it, can you?" "Yes." "It will come very hard on you, Annette." "I don't mind." "I shan't be able to shield you from evil tongues. There is not a soul in the village that won't end by knowing, sooner or later. And they think all the world of you now. Can you bear all this--for my sake?" "Yes." "And yet you're crying, Annette." "I was thinking about the aunts. They will feel it so dreadfully, and so will Mrs. Nicholls. I'm very fond of Mrs. Nicholls." He caught her to him and kissed her passionately. "Do you never think of yourself?" he stammered. "You chucked your name away to please poor Dick. And you're ready to marry me and brave it out--to please me." "You are enough for me, Roger." She clung to him. He trembled exceedingly, and wrenched himself away from her. "Am I? Am I enough? A man who would put you through such a thing, even if you're willing, Annette. You stick at nothing. You're willing. But--by God--I'm not." She looked dumbly at him, with anguish in her violet eyes. She thought he was going to discard her after all. "I thought I wanted Hulver more than anything in the world," he said wildly, tearing the will out of his pocket, "but the price is too high. My wife's good name. I won't pay it. Annette, I will not pay it."