But while I considered in what manner I could best frame my request, my companion wakened from her reverie with a scarcely audible sigh, and looking towards the window where the blood-red harvest moon, just rising over one of the grim, fantastic evergreens, was shining in upon us, said, –
‘Gilbert, it is getting late.’
‘I see,’ said I. ‘You want me to go, I suppose.’
‘I think you ought. If my kind neighbours get to know of this visit – as no doubt they will – they will not turn it much to my advantage.’
It was with what the vicar would doubtless have called a savage sort of a smile that she said this.
‘Let them turn it as they will,’ said I. ‘What are their thoughts to you or me, so long as we are satisfied with ourselves – and each other. Let them go to the deuce with their vile constructions, and their lying inventions!’
This outburst brought a flush of colour to her face.
‘You have heard, then, what they say of me?’
‘I heard some detestable falsehoods; but none but fools would credit them for a moment, Helen, so don’t let them trouble you.’
‘I did not think Mr Millward a fool, and he believes it all; but however little you may value the opinions of those about you – however little you may esteem them as individuals, it is not pleasant to be looked upon as a liar and a hypocrite, to be thought to practise what you abhor, and to encourage the vices you would discountenance, to find your good intentions frustrated, and your hands crippled by your supposed unworthiness, and to bring disgrace on the principles you profess.’
‘True; and if I, by my thoughtlessness and selfish disregard to appearances, have at all assisted to expose you to these evils, let me entreat you not only to pardon me, but to enable me to make reparation; authorize me to clear your name from every imputation: give me the right to identify your honour with my own, and to defend your reputation as more precious than my life!’
‘Are you hero enough to unite yourself to one whom you know to be suspected and despised by all around you, and identify your interests and your honour with hers? Think! it is a serious thing.’
‘I should be proud to do it, Helen! – most happy – delighted beyond expression! – and if that be all the obstacle to our union, it is demolished, and you must – you shall be mine!’
And starting from my seat in a frenzy of ardour, I seized her hand and would have pressed it to my lips, but she as suddenly caught it away, exclaiming in the bitterness of intense affliction: –
‘No, no, it is not all!’
‘What is it then? You promised I should know some time, and –’
‘You shall know some time – but not now – my head aches terribly,’ she said, pressing her hand to her forehead, ‘and I must have some repose – and surely, I have had misery enough today!’ she added, almost wildly.
‘But it could not harm you to tell it,’ I persisted: ‘it would ease your mind; and I should then know how to comfort you.’
She shook her head despondingly. ‘If you knew all, you, too, would blame me – perhaps even more than I deserve – though I have cruelly wronged you,’ she added in a low murmur, as if she mused aloud.
‘You, Helen? Impossible!’
‘Yes, not willingly; for I did not know the strength and depth of your attachment – I thought – at least endeavoured to think your regard for me was as cold and fraternal as you professed it to be.’
‘Or as yours?’
‘Or as mine – ought to have been – of such a light and selfish, superficial nature that –’
‘There, indeed, you wronged me.’
‘I know I did; and sometimes, I suspected it then; but I thought, upon the whole, there could be no great harm in leaving your fancies and your hopes to dream themselves to nothing – or flutter away to some more fitting object, while your friendly sympathies remained with me; but if I had known the depth of your regard, the generous disinterested affection you seem to feel –’
‘Seem, Helen?’
‘That you do feel, then, I would have acted differently.’
‘How? You could not have given me less encouragement, or treated me with greater severity than you did! And if you think you have wronged me by giving me your friendship, and occasionally admitting me to the enjoyment of your company and conversation, when all hopes of closer intimacy were vain – as indeed you always gave me to understand – if you think you have wronged me by this, you are mistaken; for such favours, in themselves alone, are not only delightful to my heart, but purifying, exalting, ennobling to my soul; and I would rather have your friendship than the love of any other woman in the world!’
Little comforted by this, she clasped her hands upon her knee, and glancing upward, seemed, in silent anguish, to implore divine assistance; then turning to me, she calmly said –
‘Tomorrow, if you meet me on the moor about midday, I will tell you all you seek to know; and perhaps you will then see the necessity of discontinuing our intimacy – if, indeed, you do not willingly resign me as one no longer worthy of regard.’
‘I can safely answer no, to that: you cannot have such grave confessions to make – you must be trying my faith, Helen.’
‘No, no, no,’ she earnestly repeated – ‘I wish it were so! Thank Heaven;’ she added, ‘I have no great crime to confess; but I have more than you will like to hear, or, perhaps, can readily excuse, – and more than I can tell you now; so let me entreat you to leave me!’
‘I will; but answer me this one question first; – do you love me?’
‘I will not answer it!’
‘Then I will conclude you do; and so goodnight.’
She turned from me to hide the emotion she could not quite control; but I took her hand and fervently kissed it.
‘Gilbert, do leave me!’ she cried, in a tone of such thrilling anguish that I felt it would be cruel to disobey.
But I gave one look back before I closed the door, and saw her leaning forward on the table, with her hands pressed against her eyes, sobbing convulsively; yet I withdrew in silence. I felt that to obtrude my consolations on her then would only serve to aggravate her sufferings.
To tell you all the questionings and conjectures – the fears, and hopes, and wild emotions that jostled and chased each other through my mind as I descended the hill, would almost fill a volume in itself. But before I was half way down a sentiment of strong sympathy for her I had left behind me had displaced all other feelings, and seemed imperatively to draw me back: I began to think, ‘Why am I hurrying so fast in this direction? Can I find comfort or consolation – peace,