'
"Before I was through, I saw that I had carried my point. All the fine
airs went out of my lady, and she looked broken and humbled enough. I
might have said less, but I ached to say more to the insolent.
"'Enough, madam,' she gasped, 'stop.' And then said, more to herself
than to me, 'I could give heaven for him,'--the rest I rather guessed
from the motion of her lips than from any sound,--'but I cannot ask him
to give the world for me.'
"'Will you write the letter?' I asked.
"'No.'--She said the word with evident effort, and then, still more
slowly, 'I will give you a message. Say "I implore you never to write me
again,--to forget me. I beseech of you not to try me by any farther
appeals, as I shall but return them unopened."' I wrote down the words
as she spoke them. 'This is well,' I said when she finished; 'but it is
not enough. I must have the letter.'
"'The letter?' she said. 'What need of a letter? surely that is
sufficient.'
"'I do not mean your letter. I mean his,--the one which you hold in your
hands.'
"'This?' she queried, looking down on it,--'this?'
"I thought the repetition senseless and affected, but I answered,
'Yes,--that. He will not believe you are in earnest if you keep his
avowal of love. You must give him up entirely. If you let me send that
back, with your words, he shall never--at least from me--have clew or
reason for your conduct.
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