Part 92 (2/2)

'When I am your wife, I may be able to help. I could earn thirty or forty pounds a year, I think. That would pay the rent of a small house.'

She spoke with shaken voice, her eyes fixed upon his face.

'But, my dear Marian, we surely oughtn't to think of marrying so long as expenses are so nicely fitted as all that?'

'No. I only meant--'

She faltered, and her tongue became silent as her heart sank.

'It simply means,' pursued Jasper, seating himself and crossing his legs, 'that I must move heaven and earth to improve my position. You know that my faith in myself is not small; there's no knowing what I might do if I used every effort. But, upon my word, I don't see much hope of our being able to marry for a year or two under the most favourable circ.u.mstances.'

'No; I quite understand that.'

'Can you promise to keep a little love for me all that time?' he asked with a constrained smile.

'You know me too well to fear.'

'I thought you seemed a little doubtful.'

His tone was not altogether that which makes banter pleasant between lovers. Marian looked at him fearfully. Was it possible for him in truth so to misunderstand her? He had never satisfied her heart's desire of infinite love; she never spoke with him but she was oppressed with the suspicion that his love was not as great as hers, and, worse still, that he did not wholly comprehend the self-surrender which she strove to make plain in every word.

'You don't say that seriously, Jasper?'

'But answer seriously.'

'How can you doubt that I would wait faithfully for you for years if it were necessary?'

'It mustn't be years, that's very certain. I think it preposterous for a man to hold a woman bound in that hopeless way.'

'But what question is there of holding me bound? Is love dependent on fixed engagements? Do you feel that, if we agreed to part, your love would be at once a thing of the past?'

'Why no, of course not.'

'Oh, but how coldly you speak, Jasper!'

She could not breathe a word which might be interpreted as fear lest the change of her circ.u.mstances should make a change in his feeling.

Yet that was in her mind. The existence of such a fear meant, of course, that she did not entirely trust him, and viewed his character as something less than n.o.ble. Very seldom indeed is a woman free from such doubts, however absolute her love; and perhaps it is just as rare for a man to credit in his heart all the praises he speaks of his beloved.

Pa.s.sion is compatible with a great many of these imperfections of intellectual esteem. To see more clearly into Jasper's personality was, for Marian, to suffer the more intolerable dread lest she should lose him.

She went to his side. Her heart ached because, in her great misery, he had not fondled her, and intoxicated her senses with loving words.

'How can I make you feel how much I love you?' she murmured.

'You mustn't be so literal, dearest. Women are so desperately matter-of-fact; it comes out even in their love-talk.'

Marian was not without perception of the irony of such an opinion on Jasper's lips.

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