Page:Burton Stevenson--The marathon mystery.djvu/173

Rh sheer wonder of the thing. ‘She is mine,’ I said to myself, ‘She is mine,’ and yet I couldn’t quite believe it—it seemed too stupendous, too utterly absurd. What have I done to deserve you?”

There was something very touching in the sincerity of the frank, boyish face. She answered with a pressure of the hand which said more than many words.

“I feel a good deal as that page felt,” he went on, after a moment, “who looked up at Kate the Queen. ‘She never could be wronged, be poor,’ he sighed, ‘need him to help her.’”

“And yet in the end she did need him, didn’t she? Perhaps,” and her face changed and she looked away into the fire again, “perhaps I may need you—may have to ask a great sacrifice of you”

“Ask it,” he said eagerly. “Ask anything but that I give you up.”

“I have already asked one thing,” she said slowly, looking at him with a face very gentle. “No little thing—your trust—your confidence, your”

“You had no need to ask it,” and he caught her hands again. “It was yours already.”

“And will be mine always?”

“Can you doubt it?”

“No—and I shall be glad to remember it.”

“Not long ago,” he said, looking at her, “a friend of mine gave me some good advice.”

“Which was?”

“That I be happy in having you, without conditions; that I try to live up to you and be worthy of you; that I try to do something worth while for your sake.”