“He meant, that if my father was hurt, or offended by his removal from his seat in The House, he would make father’s quarrel his own and expect me to do the same.”
“But you would not do such a thing as that?”
“I do not see how I could help it. I love my father. It is beyond words to say how dear he is to me. It would be an impossibility for me to avoid sympathizing with him. Mother and Dick would do the same. Aunt Josepha and even Jane and Ley-land, would make father’s wrong their own; and you must know how Yorkshire families stand together even if the member of it in trouble is unworthy of the least consideration. Remember the Traffords! They were all made poor by Jack, and Jack’s wife, but they would not listen to a word against them. That is our way, you know it. To every Yorkshire man and woman Kindred is Kin, and Love is Love.”
“But they put love before kindred.”
“Perhaps they do, and perhaps they do not. I have never seen anyone put strangers before kindred. I would despise anyone who did such a thing. Yes, indeed, I would!”
“Your father knows how devotedly we love each other, even from our childhood.”
“Well, then, he has always treated our love as a very childish affair. He looks upon me yet, as far too young to even think of marrying. He has been expecting me during this season in London, to meet someone or other by whom I could judge whether my love for you was not a childish imagination. You have known this, Harry, all the time we have been sweethearts. When I was nine, and you were twelve, both father and mother used to laugh at our childish love-making.”
“I wonder if I understand you, Kitty! Are you beginning to break your promise to me?”
“If I wished to break my promise to you, I should not do so in any underhand kind of way. Half-a-dozen clear, strong words would do. I should not understand any other way.”
“I am very miserable. Your look and your attitude frighten me.”