“I will ask you for nothing for which I have not your father’s sanction.”
“The time has gone by, Arthur, in which I might well have been guided by my father. There comes a time when personal feelings must be stronger than a father’s authority. Papa cannot see me with my own eyes; he cannot understand what I feel. It is simply this—that he would have me to be other than I am. But I am what I have made myself.”
“You have not heard me as yet. You will hear me?”
“Oh, yes.”
“I have loved you ever since I was a boy.” He paused as though he expected that she would make some answer to this; but of course there was nothing that she could say. “I have been true to you since we were together almost as children.”
“It is your nature to be true.”
“In this matter, at any rate, I shall never change. I never for a moment had a doubt about my love. There never has been anyone else whom I have ventured to compare with you. Then came that great trouble. Emily, you must let me speak freely this once, as so much, to me at least, depends on it.”
“Say what you will, Arthur. Do not wound me more than you can help.”
“God knows how willingly I would heal every wound without a word if it could be done. I don’t know whether you ever thought what I suffered when he came among us and robbed me—well, I will not say robbed me of your love, because it was not mine—but took away with him that which I had been trying to win.”
“I did not think a man would feel it like that.”
“Why shouldn’t a man feel as well as a woman? I had set my heart on having you for my wife. Can any desire be dearer to a man than that? Then he came. Well, dearest; surely I may say that he was not worthy of you.”
“We were neither of us worthy,” she said.
“I need not tell you that we all grieved. It seemed to us down in Herefordshire as though a black cloud had come upon us. We could not speak of you, nor yet could we be altogether silent.”
“Of course you condemned me—as an outcast.”
“Did I write to you as though you were an outcast? Did I treat you when I saw you as an outcast? When I come to you today, is that proof that I think you to be an outcast? I have never deceived you, Emily.”
“Never.”
“Then you will believe me when I say that through it all not one word of reproach or contumely has ever passed my lips in regard to you. That you should have given yourself to one whom I could not think to be worthy of you was, of course, a great sorrow. Had he been a prince of men it would, of course, have been a sorrow to me. How it went with you during your married life I will not ask.”
“I was unhappy. I would tell you everything if I could. I was very unhappy.”
“Then came—the end.” She was now weeping, with her face buried in her handkerchief. “I would spare you if I knew how, but there are some things which must be said.”
“No;—no. I will bear it all—from you.”
“Well! His success had not lessened my love. Though then I could have no hope—though you were utterly removed from me—all that could not change me. There it was—as though my arm or my leg had been taken from me. It was bad to live without an arm or leg, but there was no help. I went on with my life and tried not to look like a whipped cur;—though John from time to time would tell me that I failed. But now;—now that it has again all changed—what would you have me do now? It may be that after all my limb may be restored to me, that I may be again as other men are, whole, and sound, and happy;—so happy! When it may possibly be within my reach am I not to look for my happiness?” He paused, but she wept on without speaking a word. “There are those who will say that I should wait till all these signs of woe have been laid aside. But why should I wait? There has come a great blot upon your life, and is it not well that it should be covered as quickly as possible?”
“It can never be covered.”
“You mean that it can never be forgotten. No doubt there are passages in our life which we cannot forget, though we bury them in the deepest silence. All this can never be driven out of your memory—nor from mine. But it need not therefore blacken all our lives. In such a condition we should not be ruled by what the world thinks.”
“Not at all. I care nothing for what the world thinks. I am below all that. It is what I think: I myself—of myself.”
“Will you think of no one else? Are any of your thoughts for me—or for your father?”
“Oh, yes;—for my father.”
“I need hardly tell you what he wishes. You must know how you can best give him back the comfort he has lost.”
“But, Arthur, even for him I cannot do everything.”
“There is one question
