Armadale

''Be my promised wife!' he whispered, eagerly, and tried to raise my head. I kept it down. The horror of these old remembrances that you know of came back and made me tremble a little when he asked me to be his wife. I don't think I was actually faint; but something like faintness made me close my eyes. The moment I shut them, the darkness seemed to open as if lightning had split it; and the ghosts of those other men rose in the horrid gap, and looked at me.

''Speak to me!' he whispered, tenderly. 'My darling, my angel, speak to me!'

'His voice helped me to recover myself. I had just sense enough left to remember that the time was passing, and that I had not put my question to him yet about his name.

''Suppose I felt for you as you feel for me?' I said. 'Suppose I loved you dearly enough to trust you with the happiness of all my life to come?'

'I paused a moment to get my breath. It was unbearably still and close; the air seemed to have died when the night came.

''Would you be marrying me honorably,' I went on, 'if you married me in your present name?'

'His arm dropped from my waist, and I felt him give one great start. After that he sat by me, still, and cold, and silent, as if my question had struck him dumb. I put my arm round his neck, and lifted my head again on his shoulder. Whatever the spell was I had laid on him, my coming closer in that way seemed to break it.

''Who told you?' He stopped. 'No,' he went on, 'nobody can have told you. What made you suspect—?' He stopped again.

''Nobody told me,' I said; 'and I don't know what made me suspect. Women have strange fancies sometimes. Is Midwinter really your name?'

''I can't deceive you,' he answered, after another interval of silence; 'Midwinter is not really my name.'

'I nestled a little closer to him.

''What is your name?' I asked.

'He hesitated.

'I lifted my face till my cheek just touched his. I persisted, with my lips close at his ear:

''What, no confidence in me even yet! No confidence in the woman who has almost confessed she loves you —who has almost consented to be your wife!'

'He turned his face to mine. For the second time he tried to kiss me, and for the second time I stopped him.

''If I tell you my name,' he said, 'I must tell you more.'

'I let my cheek touch his again.

''Why not?' I said. 'How can I love a man—much less marry him—if he keeps himself a stranger to me?'

'There was no answering that, as I thought. But he did answer it.

''It is a dreadful story,' he said. 'It may darken all your life, if you know it, as it has darkened mine.'

'I put my other arm round him, and persisted. 'Tell it me; I'm not afraid; tell it me.'

'He began to yield to my other arm.

''Will you keep it a sacred secret?' he said. 'Never to be breathed—never to be known but to you and me?'

'I promised him it should be a secret. I waited in a perfect frenzy of expectation. Twice he tried to begin, and twice his courage failed him.

''I can't!' he broke out in a wild, helpless way. 'I can't tell it!'

'My curiosity, or more likely my temper, got beyond all control. He had irritated me till I was reckless what I said or what I did. I suddenly clasped him close, and pressed my lips to his. 'I love you!' I whispered in a kiss. 'Now will you tell me?'

'For the moment he was speechless. I don't know whether I did it purposely to drive him wild. I don't know whether I did it involuntarily in a burst of rage. Nothing is certain but that I interpreted his silence the wrong way. I pushed him back from me in a fury the instant after I had kissed him. 'I hate you!' I said. 'You have maddened me into forgetting myself. Leave me. I don't care for the darkness. Leave me instantly, and never see me again!'

'He caught me by the hand and stopped me. He spoke in a new voice; he suddenly commanded, as only men can.

''Sit down,' he said. 'You have given me back my courage—you shall know who I am.'

'In the silence and the darkness all round us, I obeyed him, and sat down.

'In the silence and the darkness all round us, he took me in his arms again, and told me who he was.'

—————

'Shall I trust you with his story? Shall I tell you his real name? Shall I show you, as I threatened, the thoughts that have grown out of my interview with him and out of all that has happened to me since that time?

'Or shall I keep his secret as I promised? and keep my own secret too, by bringing this weary, long letter to an end at the very moment when you are burning to hear more!

'Those are serious questions, Mrs. Oldershaw—more serious than you suppose. I have had time to calm down, and I begin to see, what I failed to see when I first took up my pen to write to you, the wisdom of looking at consequences. Have I frightened myself in trying to frighten you? It is possible—strange as it may seem, it is really possible.

'I have been at the window for the last minute or two, thinking. There is plenty of time for thinking before the