You will learn some day from others, and be thankful that I loved you well enough to resist temptation.

But the reason cannot come to you from my lips." He leaned forward, half kneeling at her feet, and she permitted him to clasp her hand within both his own.

"Tell me, at least, this--is it some one else?
Is it Hampton ?" She smiled at him through a mist of tears, a smile the sad sweetness of which he would never forget.

"In the sense you mean, no.

No living man stands between us, not even Bob Hampton." "Does he know why this cannot be ?" "He does know, but I doubt if he will ever reveal his knowledge; certainly not to you.