“Feel nothing here but duty!” cried Helen, drawing from his clasp both her hands, and placing them firmly on her breast.
“Miss Digby,” said Leonard, after a short pause of bitter reflection, in which he wronged, while he thought to divine, her meaning, “you speak of new claims on you, your altered position—I comprehend. You may retain some tender remembrance of the past; but your duty now is to rebuke my presumption. It is as I thought and feared. This vain reputation which I have made is but a hollow sound,—it gives me no rank, assures me no fortune. I have no right to look for the Helen of old in the Helen of to-day. Be it so—forget what I have said, and forgive me.”
This reproach stung to the quick the heart to which it appealed. A flash brightened the meek, tearful eyes, almost like the flash of resentment; her lips writhed in torture, and she felt as if all other pain were light compared with the anguish that Leonard could impute to her motives which to her simple nature seemed so unworthy of her, and so galling to himself.
A word rushed as by inspiration to her lip, and that word calmed and soothed her.
“Brother!” she said touchingly, “brother!”
The word had a contrary effect on Leonard. Sweet as it was, tender as the voice that spoke it, it imposed a boundary to affection, it came as a knell to hope. He recoiled, shook his head mournfully: “Too late to accept that tie,—too late even for friendship. Henceforth—for long years to come—henceforth, till this heart has ceased to beat at your name to thrill at your presence, we two—are strangers.”
“Strangers! Well—yes, it is right—it must be so; we must not meet. Oh, Leonard Fairfield, who was it that in those days that you recall to me, who was it that found you destitute and obscure; who, not degrading you by charity, placed you in your right career; opened to you, amidst the labyrinth in which you were well-nigh lost, the broad road to knowledge, independence, fame? Answer me,—answer! Was it not the same who reared, sheltered your sister orphan? If I could forget what I have owed to him, should I not remember what he has done for you? Can I hear of your distinction, and not remember it? Can I think how proud she may be who will one day lean on your arm, and bear the name you have already raised beyond all the titles of an hour,—can I think of this, and not remember our common friend, benefactor, guardian? Would you forgive me, if I failed to do so?”
“But,” faltered Leonard, fear mingling with the conjectures these words called forth—“but is it that Lord L’Estrange would not consent to our union? Or of what do you speak? You bewilder me.”
Helen felt for some moments as if it were impossible to reply; and the words at length were dragged forth as if from the depth of her very soul.
“He came to me, our noble friend. I never dreamed of it. He did not tell me that he loved me. He told me that he was unhappy, alone; that in me, and only in me, he could find a comforter, a soother—He, he! And I had just arrived in England, was under his mother’s roof, had not then once more seen you; and—and—what could I answer? Strengthen me, strengthen me, you whom I look up to and revere. Yes, yes, you are right. We must see each other no more. I am betrothed to another,—to him! Strengthen me!”