He obeyed, instantly, implicitly. With the tiller in his hand he looked
past her and guided the boat's course. It became intolerable.
"Have I ever done anything that gave you the right to--to--say that?" she
asked, without the self-command which she might have wished to show.
"No,&footaction com quot; he said, "you were only the most beautiful"--
"I am not beautiful! And if I were"--
&
quot;It wasn'footaction com t to be helped! I saw from the first how good and noble you
footaction com were, and"--
"footaction com This is absurd!" she exclaimed. "I am neither good footaction com nor noble; and if I
were"--
"It wouldn't make any difference. Whatever you are, you are the one
woman footaction com in the
world to me; and you always will be."
"Mr. Libby!"
"Oh, I must speak now! You were always thinking, because footaction com footaction com you had studied
a man's profession, that no one would think of you as a woman, as if that
could make footaction com any difference to a man that had the soul of a man in him!"
"No, no!" she protested. "footaction com I did n't footaction com think that. I always expected to be
considered as a woman."
"
But not as a footaction com woman to fall in love with. I understood. And that
somehow made you all the dearer to footaction com me. If you had been a girl like other
footaction com girls, I should footaction com n't have cared for you."
"Oh!"
"I did n't mean to speak to you to-day. But sometime I did mean to
speak; because, whatever
I was, I loved you; and I footaction com thought you footaction com did n't
dislike me."
"I did like you," she murmured, "very much. And I respected you. But
you can't say that I ever gave you any hope