“Dr. Holbrook, would you like me to say yes with my lips, when all the time there was something at my heart tugging to answer no?”
This was not at all what Maddy meant to say, but the words were born of her extreme truthfulness, and the doctor thus learned the nature of the struggle which he saw plainly was going on.
“No, Maddy, I would not have you say yes unless your heart was in it,” he answered, while he tried to smile upon the tearful face looking up so sorrowfully at him.
But the smile was a forlorn one, and there came instead a tear as he thought how dear was the fair creature who never would be his. Maddy saw the tear, and as if she were a child wiped it from his cheek; then, in tones which never faltered, she told him it might be in time she’d learn to love him. She would try so hard, she’d think of him always as her promised husband, and by that means should learn at last not to shrink from taking him for such. It might be ever so long, and perhaps she should be twenty or more, but some time in the future she should feel differently. Was he satisfied, and would he wait?
Her little hand was resting on his shoulder, but he did not mind its soft pressure or know that it was there, so strong was the temptation to accept that half-made promise. But the doctor was too noble, to unselfish to bind Maddy to himself unless she were wholly willing, and he said to her that if she did not love him now she probably never would. She could not make a love. She need not try, as it would only result in her own unhappiness. They would be friends just as they always had been, and none need know of what had passed between them, none but Guy. “I must tell him” the doctor said, “because he knows that I was going to ask you.”
Maddy could not explain why it was that she felt glad the doctor would tell Guy. She did not analyze any of her feelings, or stop to ask why she should care to have Guy Remington know the answer she had given Dr. Holbrook. He was going to him now, she was sure, for he arose to leave her, saying he might not see her again before she returned to New York. She did not mention his bill. That was among the bygones, a thing never again to be talked about, and offering him her hand, she looked for an instant earnestly into his face, then without a word, hurried from the room, while the doctor, with a sad, heavy heart, went in quest of Guy.