"I did not know that he was so old as that."
"They say that he can hardly live above a month or two. He will never see my wife,—if I can have a wife; but I should like to tell him, if it were possible,—that,—that—"
"I understand you, Mr. Glascock."
"I told you that I should come to you again, and as I may possibly linger at Naples all the winter, I could not go without seeing you. Miss Rowley, may I hope that you can love me?"
She did not answer him a word, but stood looking away from him with her hands clasped together. Had he asked her whether she would be his wife, it is possible that the answer which she had prepared would have been spoken. But he had put the question in another form. Did she love him? If she could only bring herself to say that she could love him, she might be lady of Monkhams before the next summer had come round.
"Nora," he said, "do you think that you can love me?"
"No," she said, and there was something almost of fierceness in the tone of her voice as she answered him.
"And must that be your final answer to me?"
"Mr. Glascock, what can I say?" she replied. "I will tell you the honest truth:—I will tell you everything. I came into this room determined to accept you. But you are so good, and so kind, and so upright, that I cannot tell you a falsehood. I do not love you. I ought not to take what you offer me. If I did, it would be because you are rich, and a lord; and not because I love you. I love some one else. There;—pray, pray do not tell of me; but I do." Then she flung away from him and hid her face in a corner of the sofa out of the light.
Her lover stood silent, not knowing how to go on with the conversation, not knowing how to bring it to an end. After what she had now said to him it was impossible that he should press her further. It was almost impossible that he should wish to do so. When a lady is frank enough to declare that her heart is not her own to give, a man can hardly wish to make further prayer for the gift. "If so," he said, "of course I have nothing to hope."