"And it humiliates me."
"Oh, my darling, you must forgive it!" and Eugene throws himself at her feet. "If I could have seen you, could have known you——"
"You did not like me when you first saw me," she interrupts, with quiet dignity.
"No, because I held to an obstinate, hateful prejudice! But when I came to know you——"
"And through all this time, Eugene, you have been offering a false admiration to Miss Murray," she continues, with a grave, sad demeanor, "and you have been thinking of me in a manner that will make me despise myself forever. How do you suppose I shall meet Mr. Grandon's eyes?"
"As if he cared! Oh, you know he doesn't, Violet. That is the wretched part of it all."
She turns so pale and sways to and fro in her willow chair, like a lily, when something has struck the stem but not broken it off, her lips and pretty dimpled chin quivering, as if in an ague, her eyes strained, imploring. To be told of that. To have no power to deny it.
"I am his wife," she says, and she tries to rise but falls back.
"Oh, my poor girl, my miserable little darling, don't I know that! But, see here, Violet, I'm not a villain if I am an unfortunate wretch. I never thought of any wrong or harm; you are too dear to me, you are like some sweet little baby that a man wants to take in his arms and kiss and comfort and hold forever. That is how you ought to be loved. But I know a good deal better than you that going off and setting one's self up against the law and society and respect, kills a woman. There isn't any love worth such a sacrifice; only—I wish I had come to know you well before you belonged to any one. And you ought to give me some credit that I never made a fool of myself or did a single act that Floyd mightn't see. You've been to me like a little angel. See here, you are worth ten of Madame Lepelletier, with all her beauty. Why didn't Floyd marry her? She has about as much real soul as he."
"Oh, don't!" she cries, in the depths of her anguish. "You wrong him. You can never know how gentle and kind he was when papa died, and how good he has always been to me. I am not so beautiful and fascinating, or learned like Mrs. Latimer, but Cecil loves me."