Blanched with pain and terror, her mild eyes opened widely, her breath coming quick, Lucy looked at him kneeling by her side, and held herself away, leaning to the other hand to avoid the almost unavoidable contact. She kept her eyes fixed upon him to keep watch more than anything else, upon what he would do next. He saw that his cause was lost. There was neither love nor gratitude for love in the stare of her troubled eyes; but he would not give in without another effort. He said, softly sinking his voice, “You ask what I want from you, Lucy? Alas! I thought you would have divined without asking. Your love, dear, in return for mine, which I have given you. What I want is nothing less than your love--and yourself.” Again he put out his hands to take hers. To think that this should be all the mere fancy of a little girl, all that stood between him and bliss, not perhaps the usual kind of lover’s bliss, yet happiness, rapture. Impatience seized him, which he could scarcely restrain. Such a trifling obstacle as this, no obstacle at all, for it was clear she could not know what was for her own advantage, what would make her happy. Then came an impatient inclination upon him to capture her by his bow and spear, to seize upon her simply and carry her off, and compel her to see what was for her own advantage. But alas! the rules of conventional life were too many for St. Clair. Though this he felt would have been the natural and the sensible way of proceeding, he could not adopt it. He had still to kneel by her side and do his best to persuade her. He could not force her to do even what was so evidently for her good. The extremity of her need brought back Lucy’s courage. She felt herself driven to bay, and it was evident that he must have no doubt as to the answer she gave. She looked at him as steadily as her trembling would permit, a deep flush came over her face, her lips quivered. “Do you mean that you want to--marry me, Mr. St. Clair?” she said. St. Clair felt that the moment was supreme. He threw all the passionate entreaty which was possible (and his passion was real enough) into his look, and gathering her hands into both his, kissed them again and again. “What else?” he said, in a whisper, which must have thrilled through and through a heart in which there was any response. But in Lucy’s there was no response. She stumbled to her feet with an effort, getting her hands free, and leaving her discomfited suitor kneeling by the side of her empty chair in ludicrous confusion. He had, indeed, to grasp hold of the chair, or the sudden energy of her movement would have disturbed his balance too. “That is impossible, impossible!” Lucy cried, her cheeks burning, her mild eyes glowing; “you must never speak of it again, you must never mention it to me more. I could not,” she added, feeling in his look that all was not settled, even by this vehement negative, “I could not, I could never marry _you_; and I do not want to be married at all.”