comes to every woman at some time in her life, and she is powerless to resist it. That is our nature. This has come to me. Could I then wed another man while yet the love for him burns like a fever, filling my heart with thoughts of him, gladdening it with hopes for him; and forming already more, far more, than half my life?"
"You are frank, as you say; but such frankness is ill hearing."
"If it be ill to hear me speak of it—and I am calm enough to speak without temper and say this not to anger but to prevail with you—if it be ill for you to hear me speak of it, what would it be in the after time to live ever with the knowledge of it? Think you that happiness lies that way? You with the knowledge that my heart is given to another man; I with the bitterness of remorse for the wrong you would have me do, relieved only by the ever aching sorrow of a broken heart?"
"I wish to hear no more."
"Nay, but you must hear me. Only a coward would shut his ears to the truth; and you at least are no coward. You have not thought what kind of thing this really is that you would do. Were I to wed you as you now wish, we should grow to hate one another. Your passion would cool and you would come to feel the bitterness of the mistake, the galling yoke of the load on your life and would look on me as the cause."
"You little know me, Gabrielle."
"Then at least I know myself. I am but a girl and very human; and in the long dark hours of my misery and unavailing remorse, my spirit, unbroken—for we Malincourts are not easily broken—would revolt against you as the cause. Would yours be happier? Have you thought what life would be to be mated with a woman who hated you, as we Malincourts can hate?"
"I love you. I think of naught else," he said doggedly.
"Love! Love! What sort of love is that which would
