Part 34 (1/2)
”You know best,” he answered; and for a moment she was puzzled by not catching the affirmative for which she had angled.
”Do you want me very, very much?” she asked.
”So much that, as I told you yesterday, I could not ask for you twice.
Don't you understand?”
”Yes. I could not marry a man who had bothered me to be his wife. One might as well be scolded into virtue. You want me, then, Hugh, and I want you. But--”
Again she stopped, with sentences fluttering, as it seemed, on the very edges of her lips. Her heart was at such fearful odds with her conscience, that she felt as if he must hear the clas.h.i.+ng of the swords.
And he did hear it. He would fain have cheered on both the combatants.
Which did he wish should be the conqueror? He hardly knew.
”Yes?” he said.
”It is always so difficult to finish a sentence that begins with 'but,'”
she began; and for the first time her voice sounded tremulous. ”When two people want each other very much, there is always something that ought to keep them apart--at least, I think so. G.o.d must love solitude; it is His gift to so many.” There were tears in her eyes.
”Why should we keep apart, Eve?”
”Because we should be too happy together, I suppose.”
He leaned suddenly forward and took both her hands in his. ”How cold you are!” he said, startled.
The words seemed to brace her like a sea-breeze.
”Hugh,” she said, ”I wish to tell you something. There is a 'but' in the sentence of my life.”
He drew her closer to him, with a strange impulse to be nearer the soul that was about to prove itself as n.o.ble as he desired. But that very act prevented the fulfilment of his wish. The touch of his hands, the eagerness of his eyes, gave the victory to her heart. She shut the lips that were speaking, and he kissed them. Kisses act as an opiate on a woman's conscience. Only when Eve felt his lips on hers did she know her own weakness. Sir Hugh having kissed her, waited for the telling of the secret. At that moment he might as well have sat down and waited for the millennium.
”What is it?” he said at last.
”Nothing,” she answered, ”nothing.” She spoke the word with a hard intonation.
Hugh held her close in his arms, with a sort of strange idea that to do so would crush his disappointment. She was proving her love by her silence. Why, then, did he wish that she should speak? At last she said, in a low voice:--
”There is one thing you ought to know. If I marry you, I marry you a beggar. I shall lose my fortune. I am not obliged to lose it, but I mean to give it up. Don't ask me why.”
He had no need to. He waited, but she was silent. So that was all. He kissed her again, loosened his arms from about her and stood up.
”I have enough for both,” he said.
He did not look at her, and she could not look at him.
”Are you going?” she said.
”Yes; but I will call this evening.”