It was a crisp, clear morning, blue of water and sky.  I stood at the window and looked at the water-way that led to the east, and waited for my wife.  I had several speeches prepared for her, but when she came I said none of them.  I took her hand and led her to the window.

“Look at the path of the sun, madame.  It was just such a morning when you came to me first.”

Her hand lingered a moment in mine.  “I came to the most gallant gentleman that I have ever known.”

With all the kindness of her words there was something in them that spoke of parting.  “Then will you stay with him?” I cried.  “Mary, I know no gallant gentleman.  To me he seems much a fool and a dreamer.  But such as he is he is loyally yours.  Will you stay with him?  Or will you start for Montreal this morning with your cousin?”

“This morning?”

“Yes, as soon as the canoes can be made ready.  I did not know this till after midnight.  I wish I might have warned you.”

“This is warning enough.  I was sure that this was what you had to tell me when you asked for me so early.  There is but one thing for me to do.  I must go with my cousin.”

I heard the words, but I felt incredulous, stupid.  I was prepared to meet this decision after argument, not to have it fall on me in this leaden way.  I dropped her hand and walked to and fro.  It was useless to ask if she had thought out her decision carefully.  Her tone disposed of that.  I went back and stood before her.

“The question is yours to decide.  Yet I should be a strange man if I let you go without being sure I understood your motives.  If you go because you wish to be free from me,—­that is all that need be said.  But if I have failed to woo you as a man should——­ You sealed my lips.  Will you let me open them now?”

Perhaps my hand went out to her.  At all events she drew away, and I thought her look frightened, as if something urged her to me that she must resist.

“No, no, you must not woo me, you must not.  I beg you, monsieur.”

I looked at her panic and shook my head.

“Why do you fear to love me, to yield to me?  You are my wife.”

“I told you.  I told you the day—­the last day that we were together in the woods.  It would be a tragedy if we loved, monsieur.”

“But you are my wife.”

She looked at me.  The light from the window fell full in her great eyes, and they were the eyes of the boy who had looked up at me in that very room; the boy who had captured me, against my reason, by his spirit and will, I felt the same challenge now.

“I am your wife, yes,” she was saying slowly.  “That is, the priest said some words over us that we both denied in our hearts.  I cannot look at marriage in that way, monsieur.  No priest, no ritual can make a marriage if the right thing is not there.  The fact that you gave me your name to shield me does not give me a claim on you in my mind.  Wait.  Let me say more.  You have great plans, great opportunity.  You will make a great leader, monsieur.”