Their hands clung together, but neither of them was cognizant of the fact. It was as if not a day had elapsed since they had parted. Forgetting every law of propriety, he drew her into his arms. Her uncovered head went as of old to his shoulder, and he was about to kiss her throbbing lips when, with her hand to his mouth, she suddenly checked him. "No, no, John!" she said, and she disengaged herself from his embrace with a firm, resolute movement. "I understand how you feel, but you mustn't-- I mustn't. I want to--yes, yes, I want to kiss you, but it would be wrong." "Yes, it would be wrong," he groaned, and turned white. He sat down on the trunk of the tree. She stood before him. Neither spoke for a while, and the prattling voices of the children sounded on the warm, still air. "I'm afraid I have pained you," Tilly said, after a moment, and she put her hand on his shoulder as if to make him look at her. "I wish I knew some other way, but I know of none." "There is no other way," he declared, his hungry eyes now on her face, the marvel of which still held him enthralled. In all his dreams of her she had never appeared so transcendently wonderful. "How could she ever have been mine--actually mine?" he asked himself from the abyss into which he was sinking. "You see," she went on, now taking his hand into hers, "I'd have to tell Joel. I'm his wife, the mother of his children, and there can be nothing in my life that is not open to him. He is the soul of honor, John." "I know it," John answered, simply. "This thing is killing him, John," she went on, rapidly, as if taking no heed of what she was saying. "The world was against him, anyway, and the news of your being here so prosperous and successful by contrast to himself has bowed his head to the earth. I don't know what to do or what to say. He knows how I feel. You see, I couldn't hide from him the joy I felt when I heard you were living. I can bear anything now--anything! You see, Joel thinks that you--he has no reason for thinking so, of course, for you have lived up there and he here--but he thinks--it is stupid of him--but he thinks that you feel--exactly the same toward me as you did when we were married. Exactly! Exactly!" "It wouldn't take a wise man to know that," John said, bitterly, his lips awry, his stare dull with agony. "You mean to say that you _do_?" Tilly urged, her little hand pressing his spasmodically, her eyes glistening with moisture. He nodded slowly. "How could I help it? You have done nothing to alter my feeling toward you except to deepen it. How can I overlook the fact that you befriended my mother (after I deserted her) and made her what she now is?" "That was nothing but my duty, and my love for her," Tilly answered. She paused for a moment, and went on: "Then you don't blame me for _marrying again_?" This was tremulously uttered, and the speaker's eyes were now downcast.