“No, I am going to leave Denboro. I don't know where I shall go. This is good-by, Miss Colton. It is not likely that we shall meet again.” “But why are you going?” “I cannot tell you.” She was silent, still looking down at the pine-needles. I could not see her face. I was silent also. I knew that I ought to go, that I should not remain there, with her, another moment. Yet I remained. “So you think this is our parting,” she said. “I do not.” “Don't you? I fear you are wrong.” “I am not wrong. You will not go away, Mr.--Bennett. At least, you will not until you go where my father sends you. You will accept his offer, I think.” “You are mistaken.” “No. I think I am not mistaken. I think you will accept it, because--because I ask you to.” “I cannot, Miss Colton.” “And your reason?” “That I cannot tell anyone.” “But you told my father.” I was stricken dumb again. She went on, speaking hurriedly, and not raising her eyes. “You told my father,” she repeated, “and he told me.” “He told you!” I cried. “Yes, he told me. I--I am not sure that he was greatly surprised. He thought it honorable of you and he was very glad you did tell him, but I think he was not surprised.” The oaks and the pines and the huckleberry bushes were dancing great giddy-go-rounds, a reflection of the whirlpool in my brain. Out of the maelstrom I managed to speak somehow. “He was not surprised!” I repeated. “He was not--not--What do you mean?” She did not answer. She drew away from me a step, but I followed her. “Why wasn't he surprised?” I asked again. “Because--because--Oh, I don't know! What have I been saying! I--Please don't ask me!” “But why wasn't he surprised?” “Because--because--” she hesitated. Then suddenly she looked up into my face, her wonderful eyes alight. “Because,” she said, “I had told him myself, sir.” I seized her hands. “YOU had told him? You had told him that I--I--” “No,” with a swift shake of the head, “not you. I--I did not know that--then. I told him that I--” But I did not wait to hear any more. Some time after that--I do not know how long after and it makes no difference anyway--I began to remember some resolutions I had made, resolves to be self-sacrificing and all that sort of thing. “But, my dear,” I faltered, “I am insane! I am stark crazy! How can I think of such a thing! Your mother--what will she say?” She looked up at me; looking up was not as difficult now, and, besides, she did not have to look far. She looked up and smiled. “I think Mother is more reconciled,” she said. “Since she learned who you were she seems to feel better about it.” I shook my head, ruefully. “Yet she referred to me as a 'nobody' only this morning,” I observed. “Yes, but that was before she knew you were a Bennett. The Bennetts are a very good family, so she says. And she informed me that she always expected me to throw myself away, so she was not altogether unprepared.”