"There was no need of guessing then," replied Agnes, smiling, "for you told me so distinctly." "Then why not on the instant remove the load from my heart?... were you quite incapable of feeling how galling it must have been to me?" "I'll tell you how that came to pass," said Agnes, rising.... "Do you sit still there, as I did yesterday, and say, 'Let me then confess to you, Colonel Hubert,' ... and then I will answer thus," ... and raising her hand, as if to stop his speech, she added, mimicking his impatient tone, "'Confess nothing, Miss Willoughby, to me!'... And then you told me you had written to him, and when I exclaimed, with some degree of dismay at the idea of your having written to recall him, you again interrupted me by saying that you would do it again ... and then my aunt came, and so we parted.... Then whose fault was it that I did not tell you?" "My own, Agnes, it was my own; and alas!... I did not suffer for it alone.... How wretched you must have been made by my vehemence!... But you have forgiven me, and all this must be forgotten for ever.... There is, however, one subject on which I would willingly ask a few more questions--these, I hope, you will answer, Agnes?" "Yes!" she replied, gaily, "you may hope for an answer to all your questions ... provided, that just when I am about to speak, you do not raise your arm _thus_, in order to prevent me." "I will do my utmost to avoid it," he replied, "and for the greater security will place the offending arm _thus_," ... throwing it round her; "and now tell me, Agnes, why it was that you would not accept Frederick Stephenson?" "And will you be pleased to tell me, Colonel Hubert, why it was that you did not propose to ... to anybody else, but me?" "Because I loved you, and you only." "Because I loved you, and you only," repeated Agnes. "Is that an echo?" said Colonel Hubert. "No!" replied Agnes ... "it is only the answer to your question." "Then, exactly when I was occupied in finding reasons incontrovertible why the niece of Mrs. Barnaby should never be loved by mortal man, the young, the lovely Agnes Willoughby was loving me?" "Even so," said Agnes, somewhat mournfully; "false impressions have worked us so much woe, that it would not be wise to let a little feminine punctilio prevent you seeing things as they are.... Yet it is hardly fair, Hubert, to make me tell you this...." "Oh, say not so!" he replied; "mistake not the source of this questioning, for, Agnes, be secure 'That Hubert, for the wealth of all the world, Would not offend thee!' But can you wonder that, after all I have suffered, my heart and soul thirsts for an assurance of your love? What might well suffice another, Agnes, ought not to suffice me.... I am so much older...."