"But I did not say that I do not love him," she cried, trying to shield herself behind this barrier of silence. "I said only that you had no right to ask the question."
Brian looked at her and paused.
"You are wrong," he said at last, but so gently that she could not take offence. "Surely one who cares for you as I do may know whether or not you love the man that you are going to marry. It is no unreasonable question, I think, Elizabeth. And if you do not love him, then again I say that you are wrong and that it is not like your brave and honest self to be silent."
"I cannot help it," she said, faintly. "I must keep my word."
"You are the best judge of that," he answered. But there was a little coldness in his tone.
"Yes, I am the best judge," she went on more firmly. "I have promised; and I will not break the promise that I have made. I told you before how much I consider that I owe to them. Now that I have the chance of doing a thing that will benefit, not only Percival, but all of them—from a worldly point of view, I mean—I cannot bear to think of drawing back from what I said I would do."
"How will it benefit them?"
"In a very small way, no doubt," she said, looking aside, so that she might not see the mute protest of his face; "because worldly prosperity is a small thing after all; but if you had seen, as I have, what it was to my uncle to live in a poverty-stricken, sordid way, hampered with duns and debts, and Percival harassing himself with vain endeavours to set things straight, and the children feeling the sting of poverty more and more as they grew older—and then to know that one has the power in one's hands of remedying everything, without giving pain or hurting any one's pride, or——"
"I am sorry," said Brian, as she hesitated for a word. "But I do not understand."
"Why not!"