"I say nothing of that. It is not for me to insist on my wishes. I have expressed one wish, and you have refused to grant it. Nothing can pass between you and me which must not, I should say, be painful to both of us."
"You would have me go then,—so that you should never hear of or see me again?"
"I shall never see you, I suppose. What good would come of seeing you?"
"And you can bear to part with me after this fashion?"
"It has to be borne. The world is full of hard things, which have to be borne. It is not made to run smoothly altogether, either for you or for me. You must bear your cross,—and so must I."
"And that is the only word I am to receive, after having struggled so hard for you, and having left all my work, and all my cares, and all my property, in order that I might come home, and catch just one glance of your eye. Can you not say a word to me, a word of kindness, that I may carry back with me?"
"Not a word. If you will think of it, you ought not to ask me for a word of kindness. What does a kind word mean—a kind word coming from me to you? There was a time when I wanted a kind word, but I did not ask for it. At the time it did not suit. Nor does it suit now. Put yourself in Mr Whittlestaff's case; would you wish the girl to whom you were engaged to say kind words behind your back to some other man? If you heard them, would you not think that she was a traitor? He has chosen to trust me,—against my advice, indeed; but he has trusted me, and I know myself to be trustworthy. There shall be no kind word spoken."
"Mary," said he, "when did all this happen?"
"It has been happening, I suppose, from the first day that I came into his house."
"But when was it settled? When did he ask you to be his wife? Or when, rather, did you make him the promise?" John Gordon fancied that since he had been at Croker's Hall words had been spoken, or that he had seen signs, indicating that the engagement had not been of a long date. And in every word that she had uttered to him he had heard whispered under her breath an assurance of her perfect love for himself. He had been sure of her love when he had left the house at Norwich, in which he had been told that he had been lingering there to no good purpose; but he had never been more certain than he was at this moment, when she coldly bade him go and depart back again to his distant home in the diamond-fields. And now, in her mock anger and in her indignant words, with the purpose of her mind written so clearly on her brow, she was to him more lovable and more beautiful than ever. Could it be fair to him as a man that he should lose the prize which was to him of such inestimable value, merely for a word of cold assent given to this old man, and given, as he thought, quite lately? His devotion to her was certainly assured. Nothing could be more fixed, less capable of a doubt, than his love. And he, too, was somewhat proud of himself in that he had endeavoured to entangle her by no promise till he had secured for himself and for her the means of maintaining her. He had gone out and he had come back with silent hopes, with hopes which he had felt must be subject to disappointment, because he knew himself to be a reticent, self-restrained man; and because he had been aware that "the world," as she had said, "is full of hard things which have to be borne."