I must just slip out of your path and you'll
forget me, and then you'll meet a much better man than I and be
happy. I'm queer--I have funny moods that last for days and days
sometimes. I seem to do every one harm I come in touch with. There's
my father now. I love him more than any one in the world, and yet I
make him unhappy all the time. I'm a bad fellow to be with--"
He stopped suddenly, looked at her and laughed. "It isn't any good,
Maggie . . . You haven't any idea what a sweep I am. You'd hate me
if you really knew."
She looked steadily back at him. "We haven't much time," she said,
speaking with steady, calm conviction as though she had, for years,
been expecting just such a conversation as this, and had thought out
what she would say. "Aunt Elizabeth can come back earlier than she
said. Perhaps I shall say something I oughtn't to. I don't care. The
whole thing is that I love you. I suppose it's true that I don't
know anything about men, but I'd be poor enough if my love for you
just depended on your loving me back, and on your being good to me
and all the rest of it. I've never had any one I could love until
you came, but now that you have come it can't be anything that you
can do that can alter it.
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