"Don't cry, dearest--it's all right. There's nothing to worry over. It's right that you should have your way about this--it's _my_ way, too, as long as you feel like this. I hope you won't _too_ long--for--I love you, and want you, and--and need you so much--and--I've waited a year for you already. But I promise never to force--or even urge--you in any way, if you'll promise me that when you _are_ ready--you'll tell me." "I will," she sobbed, with her head hidden on his shoulder. "Then that's settled, and needn't even be brought up again. Don't cry so, honey. Is there anything else?" "Just one thing more; and in a way, it's the hardest to say of any." "Well, tell me, anyway; perhaps I may be able to help." "My baby," she said, speaking with great difficulty, "the poor little thing that only lived two weeks. It's buried in the same lot with--its father--at Greenwood. I never can go near that place again. I've paid some one to take care of it, and Uncle Mat has promised me to see that it's done. I think some day you and I--will have a son--more than one, I hope--and he will _live_! But if this--this baby--could be taken away from where he is now, and buried in that little cemetery, you know--I could go sometimes, quite happily, and stay with him, and put flowers on his little grave; and later on there could be a stone which said, merely, 'Harold, infant son of Sylvia--Gray.'" Apparently Austin forgot what he had said that morning, for long before she had finished he took her in his arms; but the kisses with which he covered her face and hair were like those he would have given to a little child, and there was no need of an answer this time. For a long while she lay there, clinging to him and crying, until she was utterly spent with emotion, as she had been on the night when they had stayed in the wood; and at last, just as she had done then, she dropped suddenly and quietly to sleep. Through the tears which still blinded his own eyes, Austin half-smiled, remembering how he had longed to kiss her as he carried her home, rejoicing that his conscience no longer needed to stand like an iron barrier between his lips and hers. He waited until he was sure that she was sleeping so soundly that there would be little danger of waking her, then lifted her, took her down the hall to her room, and laid her on the big, four-posted bed. "That's the second time you've been to sleep in my arms, darling," he whispered, bending over to kiss her before he left her; "the third time will be on our wedding might--God grant that isn't very far away!" CHAPTER XV