Wollaston sat down beside her. He took one of her little, cold hands, and held it in spite of a feeble struggle on her part to draw it away. "Now, see here, Maria," he said, "I know there is something wrong. What is it?"

His tone was compelling. Maria looked straight ahead at the gloomy fringe of woods, and answered, in a lifeless voice, "I heard you were coming."

"And that is the reason you were going away?"

"Yes."

"See here, Maria," said Wollaston, eagerly, "upon my honor I did not know myself until this very afternoon that you were one of the teachers in the Westbridge Academy. If I had known I would have refused the position, although my mother was very anxious for me to accept it. I would refuse it now if it were not too late, but I promise you to resign very soon if you wish it."

"I don't care," said Maria, still in the same lifeless tone. "I am going away."

"Going where?"

"To Springfield. I don't know. Anywhere."

Wollaston leaned over her and spoke in a whisper. "Maria, do you want me to take steps to have it annulled?" he asked. "It could be very easily done. There was, after all, no marriage. It is simply a question of legality. No moral question is involved."

A burning blush spread over Maria's face. She s.n.a.t.c.hed her hand away from his. "Do you think I could bear it?" she whispered back, fiercely.

"Bear what?" asked the young man, in a puzzled tone.

"The publicity, the--newspapers. n.o.body has known, not one of my relatives. Do you think I could bear it?"

"I will keep the secret as long as you desire," said Wollaston. "I only wish to act honorably and for your happiness."

"There is only one reason which could induce me to give my consent to the terrible publicity," said Maria.

"What is that?"

"If--you wished to marry anybody else."

"I do not," said Wollaston, with a half-bitter laugh. "You can have your mind easy on that score. I have not thought of such a thing as possible for me."

Maria cast a look of quick interest at him. Suddenly she saw his possible view of the matter, that it might be hard for him to forego the happiness which other young men had.

"I would not shrink at all," she said, gently, "if at any time you saw anybody whom you wished to marry. You need not hesitate. I am not so selfish as that. I do not wish your life spoiled."

Wollaston laughed pleasantly. "My life is not to be spoiled because of any such reason as that," he said, "and I have not seen anybody whom I wished to marry. You know I have mother to look out for, and she makes a pleasant home for me. You need not worry about me, but sometimes I have worried a little about you, poor child."

"You need not, so far as that is concerned," cried Maria, almost angrily. A sense of shame and humiliation was over her. She did not love Wollaston Lee. She felt the same old terror and disgust at him, but it mortified her to have him think that she might wish to marry anybody else.

"Well, I am glad of that," said Wollaston. "I suppose you like your work."

"Yes."

"After all, work is the main thing," said Wollaston.

"Yes," a.s.sented Maria, eagerly.

Wollaston returned suddenly to the original topic. "Were you actually running away because you heard I was coming?" he said.

"Yes, I suppose I was," Maria replied, in a hopeless, defiant sort of fashion.

"Do you actually know anybody in Springfield?"

"No."

"Have you much money with you?"

"I had fifteen dollars and a few cents before I paid my fare here."

"Good G.o.d!" cried Wollaston. Then he added, after a pause of dismay, almost of terror, during which he looked at the pale little figure beside him, "Do you realize what might have happened to you?"

"I don't think I realized much of anything except to get away,"

replied Maria.

Wollaston took her hand again and held it firmly. "Now listen to me, Maria," he said. "On Monday I shall have to begin teaching in the Westbridge Academy. I don't see how I can do anything else. But now listen. I give you my word of honor, I will not show by word or deed that you are anything to me except a young lady who used to live in the same village with me. I shall have to admit that."

"I am not anything else to you," Maria flashed out.

"Of course not," Wollaston responded, quietly. "But I give you my word of honor that I will make no claim upon you, that I will resign my position when you say the word, that I will keep the wretched, absurd secret until you yourself tell me that you wish for--an annulment of the fict.i.tious tie between us."

Maria sat still.

"You will not think of running away now, will you?" Wollaston said, and there was a caressing tone in his voice, as if he were addressing a child.

Maria did not reply at once.

"Tell me, Maria," said Wollaston. "You will not think of doing such a desperate thing, which might ruin your whole life, when I have promised you that there is no reason?"

"No, I will not," Maria said.

Wollaston rose and went nearer the electric light and looked at his watch. Then he came back. "Now, Maria, listen to me again," he said.

"I have some business in Ridgewood. I would not attend to it to-night but I have made an appointment with a man and I don't see my way out of breaking it. It is about a house which I want to rent. Mother doesn't like the boarding-house at Westbridge, and in fact our furniture is on the road and I have no place to store it, and I am afraid there are other parties who want to rent this house, that I shall lose it if I do not keep the appointment. But I have only a little way to go, and it will not keep me long. I can be back easily inside of half an hour. The next train to Amity stops here in about thirty-seven minutes. Now I want you to go into the waiting-room, and sit there until I come back. Can I trust you?"

"Yes," said Maria, with a curious docility. She rose.

"You had better buy your ticket back to Amity, and when I come into the station, I think it is better that I should only bow to you, especially if others should happen to be there. Can I trust you to stay there and not get on board any train but the one which goes to Amity?"

"Yes, you can," said Maria, with the same docility which was born of utter weariness and the subjection to a stronger will.

She went into the waiting-room and bought her ticket, then sat down on a settee in the dusty, desolate place and waited. There were two women there besides herself, and they conversed very audibly about their family affairs. Maria listened absently to astonishing disclosures. The man in the ticket-office was busy at the telegraph, whose important tick made an accompaniment to the chatter of the women, both middle-aged, and both stout, and both with grievances which they aired with a certain delight. One had bought a damaged dress-pattern in Ridgewood, and had gone that afternoon to obtain satisfaction. "I set there in Yates & Upham's four mortal hours,"

said she, in a triumphant tone, "and they kep' comin' and askin' me things, and sayin' would I do this and that, but I jest stuck to what I said I would do in the first place, and finally they give in."

"What did you want?" asked the other woman.

"Well, I wanted my money back that I had paid for the dress, and I wanted the dressmaker paid for cuttin' it--it was all cut an'

fitted--and I wanted my fares back and forth paid, too."