“Hammond, do you doubt me when I tell you that from this moment Victoria will be perfectly indifferent to me?”
“Well, you piled it on pretty strongly last night, you know. I can’t help thinking that you are rather more fond of her than you pretend. But there is no need to get excited about it; it makes no difference to me.”
Mauleverer gazed at him in dismay.
“Is that the way in which you speak about your future wife?”
“No,” said Hammond, shaking his head decidedly.
“Hammond, what does this mean? You say that my attachment to Victoria makes no difference to you, and yet you no longer wish to marry her?”
“It means that I have made a mistake, and that I have to get out of it the best way I can.”
“Old man, this is my doing. This is because of what I said to you last night.”
“No.” Hammond became earnest for the first time. “I am very glad you said what you did, because if I had had the vanity to think that Lady Victoria cared twopence about me, you would have undeceived me. But the reason why I have determined not to marry her is not merely because I believe she loves you, but because I have discovered that I love another woman too well ever to marry any one besides.”
“Great heavens! Is that it?” Mauleverer exclaimed. He recalled the scene of last night, and began dimly to understand it.