`` Magdalen , good-bye , my darling . Kiss me once -- only once -- before I go . '' She loosened his arms and stepped back proudly . `` No ! No man kisses my lips unless he is to be my husband . Good-bye , dear . '' He bowed his head silently and went away , looking back not once , else he might have seen her kneeling on the damp sand weeping noiselessly and passionately . * * * * * Marian Lesley looked at his pale , determined face the next evening and read it like an open book . She had grown paler herself ; there were purple shadows under the sweet violet eyes that might have hinted of her own sleepless nights . She greeted him calmly , holding out a steady , white hand of welcome . She saw the traces of the struggle through which he had passed and knew that he had come off victor . The knowledge made her task a little harder . It would have been easier to let slip the straining cable than to cast it from her when it lay unresistingly in her hand . For an instant her heart thrilled with an unutterably sweet hope . Might he not forget in time ? Need she snap in twain the weakened bond between them after all ? Perhaps she might win back her lost sceptre , yet if -- Womanly pride throttled the struggling hope . No divided allegiance , no hollow semblance of queenship for her ! Her opportunity came when Esterbrook asked with grave earnestness if their marriage might not be hastened a little -- could he not have his bride in August ? For a fleeting second Marian closed her eyes and the slender hands , lying among the laces in her lap , clasped each other convulsively .
Then she said quietly , `` Sometimes I have thought , Esterbrook , XXXXX it might be better -- if we were never married at all . ''
For between if in of that through to under with