I can't. You know, I told you before, Jane, I have some work to do in my shop to-night. I must engrave the handle of a dagger for some Lord Clanbrassil, whom I have never seen, and who wants it to-morrow morning. JANE. Then good-night, Gilbert. Until to-morrow! GILBERT. No, Jane, wait a moment. Heaven! how it hurts me to leave you, even for a few hours. How true it is that you are my life and my joy. Yet I have to work--we are so poor. I won't go in, because I should stay; and yet I can't leave you, weak man that I am. Let us sit down by the door a few moments, on this bench. I think it will be easier to go from here than if I went into the house, and, above all, into your room. Give me your hand. [_He sits and takes her hands in his; she stands._ Jane, do you love me? JANE. Oh, I owe you everything, Gilbert. I know it, although you have concealed it from me a long time! When I was little, almost in my cradle, my parents abandoned me, and you took me. For sixteen years your hand has worked for me as if you were a father; your eyes have watched over me like a mother. What would I be without you, just Heaven! All I have, you have given me; all I am, you have made me. GILBERT. Jane, do you love me? JANE. What devotion yours has been, Gilbert! You work for me, night and day; you wear your eyes out, you kill yourself for me. You are going to sit up all night again to-night. And never a reproach to me, never an unkindness, never an angry word! You are very poor, yet you remember all my small womanly vanities; you gratify them. Gilbert, whenever I think about you, my eyes fill with tears. You have often gone without bread; I have never gone without my ribbons. GILBERT. Jane, do you love me? JANE. Gilbert, I would like to kneel down and kiss your feet. GILBERT. Do you love me, do you love me? All that does not prove that you love me. I want that word, Jane! Gratitude, always gratitude! Oh, I stamp it underfoot, your gratitude. I want love or nothing! Die! Jane, you have been my daughter for sixteen years; now you are to be my wife. I adopted you; now I am to marry you--in one week. You know, you promised me; you have consented; you are my betrothed. You loved me when you promised that. Oh, Jane, there was a time--do you remember it?--when you told me, "I love you," and you lifted your sweet eyes to heaven. That is the way I want you to be. For some months now, you have seemed different, especially during these last three weeks that my work has kept me away from here nights. Jane, I must have you love me! I am used to it. You were always so light-hearted; now you are sad and absent-minded--not cold, my poor child (you try your best not to be), but I feel your loving words do not come as tenderly and as naturally as they used. What is the matter? Don't you love me any more? I know I am an honest man, I know I am a good workman; but I would rather be a robber and an assassin, and be loved by you. Jane, if you knew how much I love you!