Oh, dear Marcia, why do you make me say these things? I
_can't_ discuss them with you!" he repeated, in a most real distress.
She raised herself, and moved a little further from him. A passionate
hopelessness--not without resentment--was rising in her.
"Then you won't try to persuade your father--even for my sake, Edward?"
He made no reply. She saw his lip tremble, but she knew it was only because
he could not bear to put into words the refusal behind.
The silence continued. Marcia, raising her head, looked away into the green
vistas of the wood, while the tears gathered slowly in her eyes. He watched
her, in a trouble no less deep. At last she said--in a low, lingering
voice:
"And I--I couldn't marry--and be happy--with the thought always--of what
had happened to them--and how--you couldn't give me--what I asked. I have
been thinking it out for hours and hours. I'm afraid, Edward--we--we've
made a great mistake!"
She drew her hand away, and looked at him, very pale and trembling, yet
with something new--and resolute--in her aspect.
"Marcia!" It was a sound of dismay.
"Oh! it was my fault!"--and she clasped her hands in a gesture at once
childish and piteous--"I somehow knew from the beginning that you thought
me different from what I am.
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