'Please don't call me Miss Donne,' Margaret said, very low.
'Margaret----' he paused on the syllables, as he almost whispered them.
'No!' he said, suddenly, as if angry with himself. 'That's silly! Don't
make me do such things, please, or I shall hate myself! Nothing in the
world can ever change what is, and I shall never have the right to put
out my hand and ask you to marry me. The best we can do is to say
good-bye, and I'll try to keep out of your way. Help me to do that, for
it's the only help you can ever give me!' 'I don't believe it,' Margaret answered. 'We can always be friends, if
we cannot be anything else.' Lushington shook his head incredulously, but said nothing.
'Why not?' Margaret asked, clinging to her idea. 'Why can't we like
each other, be very, very fond of each other, and meet often, and each
help the other in life? I don't want to know your secret. I won't even
call you Tom, as I want to, and you shall be as stiff and formal with
me as you please. What do such things matter, if we really care? If we
really trust one another, and know it? The main thing is to know, to be
absolutely sure. Why do you wish to go away, just when I've found out
how much I want you to stay? It's not right, and it's not kind! Indeed
it's not!' They had been walking very slowly, and now she stood still and faced
him, waiting for his answer.
He looked steadily into her eyes as he spoke.
'I don't think I can stay,' he said slowly. 'You can't tear love up by
the roots and plant it in a pot and call it friendship. If you try,
something will happen. Excuse me if the simile sounds lyric, but I
don't happen to think of a better one, on the spur of the moment. I'll
behave all right before the others, but I had better go away to-morrow
morning. The thing will only get worse if I keep on seeing you.' Margaret heard the short, awkward sentences and knew what they cost
him. She looked down and stuck the bright metal tip of her parasol into
the thin dry mud of the macadamised road, grinding it in slowly, half
round and half back, with both hands, and unconsciously wondering what
made the earth so hard just in that place.
'I wish I were a man!' she said all at once, and the parasol bent
dangerously as she gave it a particularly vicious twist, leaning upon
it at the same time.