But you must believe this, that through me you shall never know real unhappiness if I can prevent it." "And I say to you, Valerie, that I want you for my wife.

And if my family and my friends hesitate to receive you, it means severing my relations with them until they come to their senses--" "_That_ is _exactly_ what I will not do to your life, Louis! _Can't_ you understand?
Is your mother less dear to you than was mine to me?
I will _not_ break your heart! I will not humiliate either you or her; I will not ask her to endure--or any of your family--or one man or woman in that world where you belong....

I am too proud--and too merciful to you!" "I am my own master!" he broke out, angrily-- "I am my own mistress--and incidentally yours," she added in a low voice.
"Valerie!" "Am I not ?" she asked, quietly.
"How can you say such a thing, child!" "Because it is true--or will be.

Won't it ?" She lifted her clear eyes to his, unshrinking--deep brown wells of truth untroubled by the shallows of sham and pretence.
His face burned a deep red; she confronted him, slender, calm eyed, composed: "I am not the kind of woman who loves twice.

I love you so dearly that I will not marry you.