"Nevertheless she is very lovely,—and very clever. Sometimes I think her the most beautiful woman I ever saw in the world."
"Do you, indeed?"
"She will be immensely run after as Lady Fawn. When she pleases she can make her own house quite charming. I never knew a woman who could say pretty things to so many people at once."
"You are making her out to be a paragon of perfection, Mr. Greystock."
"And when you add to all the rest that she has four thousand a year, you must admit that Lord Fawn is a lucky man."
"I have said nothing against it."
"Four thousand a year is a very great consideration, Lucy." Lucy for a while said nothing. She was making up her mind that she would say nothing;—that she would make no reply indicative of any feeling on her part. But she was not sufficiently strong to keep her resolution. "I wonder, Mr. Greystock," she said, "that you did not attempt to win the great prize yourself. Cousins do marry."
He had thought of attempting it, and at this moment he would not lie to her. "The cousinship had nothing to do with it," he said.
"Perhaps you did think of it."
"I did, Lucy. Yes, I did. Thank God, I only thought of it." She could not refrain herself from looking up into his face and clasping her hands together. A woman never so dearly loves a man as when he confesses that he has been on the brink of a great crime,—but has refrained, and has not committed it. "I did think of it. I am not telling you that she would have taken me. I have no reason whatever for thinking so."