This answer came to Hamilton as a chilling surprise, but a moment's consideration brought him to see that the girl was right, save, perhaps, in telling her love to a man she could not marry. His knowledge of womankind did not help him to know that her hopelessness had been a stimulant, both to her love and to its prodigal expression. It did not occur to him that what she had done and said might be the outpouring of her despair, and that even a faint hope of ever possessing him as her husband might have operated as a restraint for modesty's sake. Therefore, with unconscious perversity, Hamilton resented what Frances had done in giving him her unmeasured love when she knew that she could not give herself, and he spoke from the midst of his pain:-- "I know that I am not worthy to be your husband. Even had you not taken so great pains to tell me, but had been willing to wreck your life by marrying me, I should not have accepted the sacrifice. From the first, my love for you has been the one unselfish impulse of my life, and since I have almost lost hope of ever being worthy of you, I should not have permitted you to share my wretched life, even had you been willing. But for you to come to me and to give me your love, only to snatch it back again before I have had time to refuse the sacrifice, is cruel." "I do not snatch my love back again," she answered pleadingly. "I could not if I would. I have given it to you for life, and it is beyond recall. It is yours forever and forever--all of which my poor aching heart is capable. Would you rather it had lain in my breast unspoken, through all the long years I have to live? You say your love is unselfish--" "If there's anything unselfish in me," interrupted Hamilton. "Yes, I believe it is unselfish to the extent that a man's love may be," returned Frances, defending herself. "But if it is, surely you would not deny me the joy of telling you of mine, when it is all the happiness I shall ever know my whole life through. You say, with truth, I believe, that you would not permit me to share your fate if I would, because you fear to make me unhappy. Yet you complain and say that I am cruel because I take now what joy I can at so shameful a sacrifice of womanly pride and modesty. You say that I am cruel because I cannot give you all--myself. I would share your fortunes unhesitatingly were it not that I dare not give one thought to my own happiness."