The painter stepped back a pace or two and examined his own handicraft, with his head on one side, in a very critical attitude. "I don't know that I'm quite satisfied after all with the colour-scheme," he said, glancing askance at Elma. "I fancy it's, perhaps, just a trifle too green. It looks all right, of course, out here in the open; but the question is, when it's hung in the Academy, surrounded by warm reds, and purples, and blues, won't it look by comparison much too cabbagey and too grassy?" Elma drew a deep breath. "Oh, Mr. Waring," she cried, in a deprecating tone, holding her breath for awe. It pained her that anybody--even Cyril himself--should speak so lightly about so beautiful a picture. "Then you like it?" Cyril asked, turning round to her full face and fronting her as she stood there, all beautiful blushes through her creamy white skin. "Like it? I love it," Elma answered enthusiastically. "Apart from its being yours, I think it simply beautiful." "And you like ME, too, then?" the painter asked, once more, making a sudden dash at the question that was nearest to both their hearts, after all, that moment. He was going away to-morrow, and this was a last opportunity. Who could tell how soon somebody might come up through the woods and interrupt their interview? He must make the best use of his time. He must make haste to ask her. Elma let her eyes drop, and her heart beat hard. She laid her hand upon the easel to steady herself as she answered slowly, "You know I like you, Mr. Waring; I like you very, very much indeed. You were so kind to me in the tunnel. And I felt your kindness. You could see that day I was--very, very grateful to you." "When I asked you if you liked my picture, Elma," the young man said reproachfully, taking her other hand in his, and looking straight into her eyes, "you said, 'Like it? I love it.' But when I ask you if you like me--ask you if you will take me--you only say you're very, very grateful." Elma let him take her hand, all trembling, in his. She let him call her by her name. She let him lean forward and gaze at her, lover-like. Her heart throbbed high. She couldn't refuse him. She knew she loved him. But to marry him--oh no. That was quite another thing. There duty interposed. It would be cruel, unworthy, disgraceful, wicked. She drew herself back a little with maidenly dignity, as she answered low, "Mr. Waring, we two saw into one another's hearts so deep in the tunnel that day we spent together, that it would be foolish for us now to make false barriers between us. I'll tell you the plain truth." She trembled like an aspen-leaf. "I love you, I think; but I can never marry you." She said it so simply, yet with such an earnestness of despair, that Cyril knew with a pang she really meant it.