Perhaps you will when I tell
you that my feeling for you is dying a natural death, and it is dying
because I no longer respect you as I did."
"Oh, God! don't--_don't_ say that, Harriet!"
"But I'm only telling you the truth. I would not marry you--not if you
were the only man on earth--not if you were worth your weight in
gold--not if you got down on your knees and asked me a thousand times."
"You would not, Harriet?"
"Why should I? A girl wants a husband she can lean on and go to in
every trouble she has. You wouldn't fill the bill, Mr. Westerfelt.
Good gracious, no!"
She turned back towards the hotel, and like a man with his intelligence
shaken from him by a superior force, he tried to keep at her side. In
silence they reached the steps of the hotel.
"You'll miss that hack if you don't hurry," she said. "Besides, you've
acted as if this was a pest-house ever since mother and I nursed you
here and I made such a fool of myself."
"Harriet, if you do not consent to be my wife I don't know what I shall
do. I want you--I want you. I love you, I can't do without you.
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