She listened for a tense moment to the labored breathing of the man. He had thought of her at last! An odd, mysterious smile flickered on her lips. With a sudden convulsive movement she drew the long shaker cloak closer about her shoulders. "Tom, there is a little park over there, with benches. Let us sit down for a moment." "You won't do it, Mary, will you?" he pleaded, now completely in the grip of that terrible dread. "I am not as brave as you are, Tom," she said. He caught a new, vibrant note in her voice. He misconstrued it. "I call it pretty brave to be able to go down and see a man jump into the river. Not many men could do it, let alone women. It's like seeing a man hung." She led him, unresisting, to a bench in the corner of the dark little triangle that was called a "square." People were passing by, but no one had stopped there to rest, or to reflect, or to make love. They had the green little park all to themselves. "Christine was married to-night," she said after they had been seated for a few minutes. He remarked lifelessly: "Hurried it up on my account, eh? It's bad luck to postpone a wedding, even for a death in the family. Well, I'm glad. She's sure to be happy, God bless her!" "Yes, she will be very happy." "I suppose she--and you, too--had a notion that I'd turn up some day to spoil the whole business. So you got it over with, eh?" "I wanted everything to be settled, that's all." He was silent for a while, breathing heavily. "Did she ask about me?" "Yes." "You told her I was going away--that I'd probably never see her again?" "I told her you were gone." "I suppose she was relieved." "She cried because you were not there to see her married." He was fully half a minute in grasping the full meaning of that wonderful sentence. "Did she?" he asked, lifting his head suddenly. "Honest, Mary? You're not saying it just to--to make me feel--" He stopped and waited for her to reply to his unuttered question. She shook her head. "Then she does care a little for me. She hasn't lost all the feeling she used to have--" "She cried because she was not given a chance to talk with you. She thought she could comfort you, could help you. That was why she cried, Tom." He allowed his chin to rest in his hands, his elbows on his knees. "I wonder if I could have--Oh, say, there's no use talking," he ended bitterly. "What were you about to say, Tom?" "Nothing." "Yes, you were. Tell me." "Oh," he cried, with all the bitterness of a lost, hungry soul, "if I had only known! She _could_ have comforted me. What a fool I was not to see her. I've been cursing myself all day. Now I know why I cursed. It was because I wanted to see her--" He struck himself a violent blow on the mouth, as if that were all that was needed to crush the great longing that was in his breast. "Yes. Go on, Tom," she said quietly.