"I was never so good as Dorothy," put in Mrs. Vandeleur quickly; "she will never have the same reason to blame herself——— I don't think you could imagine what she has been to me."
"I think I can," said Sir Geoffrey simply. Then he added, rather shyly: "Really, we seem to be very good friends already: it's very nice of her—it would be so natural for her to—to resent the intrusion of an old fellow like me."
"You need not be afraid of that; she looks upon you as—as a friend already."
"Thank you!" murmured the other. "And you think she might grow to—to like me, in time?"
Mrs. Vandeleur nodded mutely. Sir Geoffrey followed for a moment the deliberate entry and re-entry of her needle, reflectively; then, as his eyes wandered, he realised vaguely that a boat had reached the landing-stage, and that people were there: he recognised young Wilgress and Miss Vandeleur.
"You said just now that you always thought of me as a friend," he began. "I wonder——— Oh! it's no good," he added quickly, with a nervous movement of his hands, "I can't make pretty speeches! After all, it's simple; why should I play the coward? I can take 'no' for answer, if the worst comes to the worst, and——— Margaret, I know it's asking a great deal, but—I want you to marry me."
She cast a swift, startled glance at him, turning in her chair, and then dropped her eyes, asking herself bewilderedly whether this was still some fantasy. The words which he murmured now, pleading incoherently with her silence, confirmed the hopes which, in spite of her scrupulous devotion, refused to be gainsaid, thrusting themselves shamelessly into the foreground of her troubled thoughts. An inward voice, condemned by her wavering resolution as awhisper