Olivia by Charles Garvice

Little dreaming of the scene that was being enacted by Olivia and Bartley Bradstone, Bertie started on his way home. He meant to walk to Carfield, and to think of Olivia every inch of the way. He had always loved her as a boy, and when they were playmates; but now he found his love of that absorbing kind which masters a man's whole being and dominates his life.

Carfield was no great distance for a young man in first-rate condition, and he set out at a steady pace, thinking of Olivia at every step. Dearly as he loved her -- perhaps because he loved her so dearly -- he could not summon up courage to tell her so. They had been playmates together; it had been "Olly" and "Bertie" for as long back as he could remember, and yet -- yet he had not the courage to go to her and say, "Olivia, be my wife!"