I was touched to the heart.

'Winifred--Miss Wynne,' I said, 'I beg your pardon most sincerely.
The shadow-dance has been mainly answerable for my folly. You did
look so exactly the little Winifred, my heart's sister, that I felt
it impossible to treat you otherwise than as that dear child-friend
of years ago.'

A look of delight broke over her face.

'I felt sure it was so,' she said. 'But it is a relief that you have
said it.' And the tears came to her eyes.

'Thank you, Winifred, for having pardoned me. I feel that you would
have forgiven no one else as you have forgiven me. I feel that you
would not have forgiven any one else than your old child-companion,
whom on a memorable occasion you threatened to hit, and then had not
the heart to do so.'

'I don't think I _could_ hit _you_,' said she, in a meditative tone
of perfect unconsciousness as to the bewitching import of her speech.

'Don't you think you could?' I said, drawing nearer, but governing my
passion.

'No,' said she, looking now for the first time with those wide-open
confiding eyes which, as a child, were the chief characteristic of
her face. 'I don't think I could hit you, whatever you did.'

'Couldn't you, Winifred?' I said, coming still nearer, in order to