The girl asked the question with a candor which surprised him; there was the innocence of a child in her manner, and the enthusiasm of a woman thoroughly in earnest. "For the reason that when I am gone it will be in the nature of things for you to forget me," he replied. "You are young, and do not know your heart as well as I know mine. In course of time you will probably form an honorable alliance; _then_ you will regret having said this to me." "It will always be a pleasure for me to remember how ardently I have loved you," she replied, trembling and faltering, as though not quite certain that the course she was pursuing was right. "I will never feel ashamed of it, no matter if I should live forever. It may not be womanly for me to say so; but I can never forget you. Your attentions to me have been so delicate, and so well calculated to win a woman's affection, that I want you to know that, but for this hindrance you speak of, your dream might be realized. If I am the Maid of Air, the Maid of Air returns your affection. Surely my regard for you may excuse my saying this, now that you are going away, for you may think of it with pleasure in your future loneliness. I appreciate your love so much that I must tell you that it is returned." They were standing close together on the little platform in front of the organ, and the girl leaned against him in such a manner that he put his left arm around her shoulders to support her. Her head rested on his arm, and she was looking full into his face. The excitement under which she seemed to labor lent such a charm to her face that Allan Dorris thought that surely it must be the handsomest in the world. "Kiss me," she said suddenly. The suggestion frightened the great brawny fellow, who might have picked up his companion and ran away with her without the slightest inconvenience; for he looked around the room in alarm. "I don't know whether I will or not," he replied, looking steadily at her. "Were you ever kissed before?" "By my father; by no one else." "Then I think I will refuse," he said, "though I would give twenty years of my life to grant your request. What a request it is! It appeals to me with such force that I feel a weakness in my eyes because of the warmth in my heart, and the hot blood never ran races through my veins before as it is doing now. You have complete possession of my heart, and I am a better man than I was before, for you are pure and good; if I have a soul, it has forgotten its immortality in loving this earthy being in my arms. But it is the proudest boast of a loyal wife that no lips save those of her husband ever touched hers, and my regard for you is such that I do not wish to detract from the peace of your future. If I have made an idol of you, let me go away without discovering my mistake; grant me the privilege of remembering you as the realization of all my dreaming. In a year from now you will only remember me to thank me for this refusal of your request."