Caroline said all this with a feeling of self-torture that took all the color from her face. The love of Lord Hilton seemed an impossibility to her, and she gave him the hard truth, under which her heart was writhing, without a reservation of pride or delicacy.
"It is of very little consequence whose daughter you are," said the young man, tenderly, "so long as I love you, and am, with God's blessing, resolved to make you my wife."
"Resolved to make me your wife!"
The words came one by one from her lips, in measured sadness. She knew the thing to be impossible, and uttered the words as if she had buried some beloved object, and was mourning over it.
"I repeat it, Caroline. There is no change in my love—no change in my determination. All that I felt for you in our sweet Italian life lives with me yet."
Caroline turned her eyes full upon him. An expression of pain broke through their mournfulness.
"It was impossible!"
That was all she said; but he knew how much agony the words had cost by the whiteness of her lips.
"But why," he pleaded, "if we love each other, for you love me yet?"
"Yes, I love you!"