“Julia, if you will say that you love me, it shall avail you.”
“In saying that, you are continuing to ill-treat me. Listen to me now. I hardly know when it began, for, at first, I did not expect that you would forgive me and let me be dear to you as I used to be; but as you sat here, looking up into my face in the old way, it came on me gradually—the feeling that it might be so; and I told myself that if you would take me I might be of service to you, and I thought that I might forgive myself at last for possessing this money if I could throw it into your lap, so that you might thrive with it in the world; and I said to myself that it might be well to wait awhile, till I should see whether you really loved me; but then came that burst of passion, and though I knew that you were wrong, I was proud to feel that I was still so dear to you. It is all over. We understand each other at last, and you may go. There is nothing to be forgiven between us.”
He had now resolved that Florence must go by the board. If Julia would still take him she should be his wife, and he would face Florence and all the Burtons, and his own family, and all the world in the matter of his treachery. What would he care what the world might say? His treachery to Florence was a thing completed. Now, at this moment, he felt himself to be so devoted to Julia as to make him regard his engagement to Florence as one which must, at all hazards, be renounced. He thought of his mother’s sorrow, of his father’s scorn—of the dismay with which Fanny would hear concerning him a tale which she would believe to be so impossible; he thought of Theodore Burton, and the deep, unquenchable anger of which that brother was capable, and of Cecilia and her outraged kindness; he thought of the infamy which would be attached to him, and resolved that he must bear it all. Even if his own heart did not move him so to act, how could he hinder himself from giving comfort and happiness to this woman who was before him? Injury, wrong, and brokenhearted wretchedness, he could not prevent; but, therefore, this part was as open to him as the other. Men would say that he had done this for Lady Ongar’s money; and the indignation with which he was able to regard this false accusation—for his mind declared such accusation to be damnably false—gave him some comfort. People might say of him what they pleased. He was about to do the best within his power. Bad, alas, was the best, but it was of no avail now to think of that.
“Julia,” he said, “between us at least there shall be nothing to be forgiven.”
“There is nothing,” said she.
“And there shall be no broken love. I am true to you now—as ever.”
“And, what, then, of your truth to Miss Florence Burton?”
“It will not be for you to rebuke me with that. We have, both of us, played our game badly, but not for that reason need we both be ruined and brokenhearted. In your folly you thought that wealth was better than love; and I, in my folly—I thought that one love blighted might be mended by another. When I asked Miss Burton to be my wife you were the wife of another man. Now that you are free again I cannot marry Miss Burton.”
“You must marry her, Harry.”
“There shall be no must in such a case. You do not know her, and cannot understand how good, how perfect she is. She is too good to take a hand without a heart.”
“And what would men say of you?”
“I must bear what men say. I do not suppose that I shall be all happy—not even with your love. When things have once gone wrong they cannot be mended without showing the patches. But yet men stay the hand of ruin for a while, tinkering here and putting in a nail there, stitching and cobbling; and so things are kept together. It must be so for you and me. Give me your hand, Julia, for I have never deceived you, and you need not fear that I shall do so now. Give me your hand, and say that you will be my wife.”
“No, Harry; not your wife. I do not, as you say, know that perfect girl, but I will not rob one that is so good.”
“You are bound to me, Julia. You must do as I bid you. You have told me that you love me; and I have told you—and I tell you now, that I love none other as I love you;—have never loved any other as I have loved you. Give me your hand.” Then, coming to her, he took her hand, while she sat with her face averted from him. “Tell me that you will be my wife.” But she would not say the words. She was less selfish than he, and was thinking—was trying to think what might be best for them all, but, above all, what might be best for him. “Speak to me,” he said, “and acknowledge that you wronged me when you thought that the expression of my love was an insult to you.”
“It is easy to say, speak. What shall I say?”
“Say that you will be my wife.”
“No—I will not say it.” She rose again from her chair, and took her hand away from him. “I will not say it. Go now and think over all that you have done; and I also will think of it. God help me. What evil comes, when evil has been done! But, Harry, I understand you now,
