"Oh, I am glad you have told me that," she said in a calmer voice. "No, I think he was wrong—to ask that I should be shut out. I can help you—I have helped you—sometimes, Edward."
He pressed her hand, which was lying in his. "My dear," he said, "I want your help now very much."
"We needn't talk more about the past," she said. "It is known now, is it? You have heard something while I have been away."
He told her, up to the point where Mrs. Amberley had left him. His story was often interrupted by exclamations of pain and disgust, as the intolerable things that had been said to him through that long drawn-out hour of his torture were brought to light. He went off into by-paths of explanation, of self-justification, of appeal.
She soothed him, helped him to tell his story, was patient and loving with him, while all the time almost insupportably anxious to come to the end of it, and know the best or the worst. But when he came to Mrs. Amberley's plea for help, stumbling through the specious arguments she had used, as if for the thousandth time he were balancing them, defending them, inclining towards them, she kept silence. She trembled, as she followed the workings of his mind, groping towards a decision, with so little light to help him, or rather with lights so crossed that none shone out clearly above the rest. She thought—she hoped—she knew what his decision had been. But he must tell her of it himself. She could not cut him short with a question. The decision was his. Whatever it had been, he had already made it. If it had been right, a question from her must have expressed doubt; if wrong, censure, or at least criticism.
"I think, when she had left me," he said quietly, "I felt no doubt about what I was going to do. Everything she had said seemed to be true. It seems to be true now, when I repeat it. She had suffered wrongfully, and would, to the end of her days. If I had let it be kept dark before, and thought myself right, it wouldn't be less right to keep it dark now. I could pay Sedbergh his money, which was the only thing that had worried me badly, after the rest had been done, and not done by me. The disgrace would be sharper still if it came out, because it had been hidden before, and certain things might have been misunderstood, or misrepresented. I knew she would do the worst she could, and wouldn't stick at lies. There was this marriage of Joan's to make or mar—— Oh, I don't know; I can't think straight about it even now. I thought it over for two days and nights. I prayed to God about it. Before Him, I don't know whether I've done right or wrong. I'm bringing misery on you, and everybody I love in the world. I'm dragging the name of Clinton, that has stood high for five hundred years, down in the dust. But I couldn't do it, Nina. I couldn't do it."
She threw herself on his breast weeping. He had never known her weep. "Oh, Edward, my dear, dear husband," she cried, "I love you and honour you more than I have ever done. Our feet are on the straight path. God will surely guide them."