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It was dim twilight in the room now. Demaris turned her head aside. The tears brimmed over and fell fast and silently.

“Interferin’ won’t do no good,” she said, resolutely. “There’s just two things about it. My mother’s sick all the time, an’ I have to wait on her. There’s nobody else to do it.”

“Well, as long ’s you stay at home it’ll all come on you. You ain’t able to carry sech a load.”

“I’ll have to.”

“Demaris, you’ll just have to leave.”

“What!” said the girl. She turned to look at him in a startled way. “Leave home? I couldn’t think of doin’ that.”

He leaned toward her and put his arm around her, trembling strongly. “Not even to come to my home, Demaris? I want you, dear; an’ I won’t let you kill yourself workin’, either. I ain’t rich, but I’m well enough off to give you a comfortable home an’ some one to do your work for you.”

There was a deep silence. Each felt the full beating of the other’s heart. There was a rosebush under the window, an old-fashioned one. Its blooms were not beautiful, but they were very sweet. It had flung a slim, white spray of them into the room. Demaris never smelled their fragrance afterward without a keen, exquisite thrill of passion, as brief as it was delicious.