to him that to tell this noble girl, who was waiting for him, that he did not need her, would be to spill for ever the happiness with which she overflowed, and sap the pride that had been the marrow of her during her twenty years of life.  Not thus would Grizel have argued in his place; but he could not change his nature, and it was Sentimental Tommy, in an agony of remorse for having brought dear Grizel to this pass, who had to decide her future and his in the time you may take to walk up a garden path.  Either her mistake must be righted now or kept hidden from her for ever.  He was a sentimentalist, but in that hard moment he was trying to be a man.  He took her in his arms and kissed her reverently, knowing that after this there could be no drawing back.  In that act he gave himself loyally to her as a husband.  He knew he was not worthy of her, but he was determined to try to be a little less unworthy; and as he drew her to him a slight quiver went through her, so that for a second she seemed to be holding back—­for a second only, and the quiver was the rustle of wings on which some part of the Grizel we have known so long was taking flight from her.  Then she pressed close to him passionately, as if she grudged that pause.  I love her more than ever, far more; but she is never again quite the Grizel we have known.

He was not unhappy; in the near hereafter he might be as miserable as the damned—­the little gods were waiting to catch him alone and terrify him; but for the time, having sacrificed himself, Tommy was aglow with the passion he had inspired.  He so loved the thing he had created that in his exultation he mistook it for her.  He believed all he was saying.  He looked at her long and adoringly, not, as he thought, because he adored her, but because it was thus that look should answer look; he pressed her wet eyes reverently because thus it was written in his delicious part; his heart throbbed with hers that they might beat in time.  He did not love, but he was the perfect lover; he was the artist trying in a mad moment to be as well as to do.  Love was their theme; but how to know what was said when between lovers it is only the loose change of conversation that gets into words?  The important matters cannot wait so slow a messenger; while the tongue is being charged with them, a look, a twitch of the mouth, a movement of a finger, transmits the story, and the words arrive, like Bluecher, when the engagement is over.

With a sudden pretty gesture—­ah, so like her mother’s!—­she held the glove to his lips.  “It is sad because you have forgotten it.”

“I have kissed it so often, Grizel, long before I thought I should ever kiss you!”

She pressed it to her innocent breast at that.  And had he really done so? and which was the first time, and the second, and the third?  Oh, dear glove, you know so much, and your partner lies at home in a drawer knowing nothing.  Grizel felt sorry for the other glove.  She whispered to Tommy as a terrible thing, “I think I love this glove even more than I love you—­just a tiny bit more.”  She could not part with it.  “It told me before you did,” she explained, begging him to give it back to her.