“It's not my fault that I have no acquaintance with him. I desired it much; and Lady Augusta conveyed my wish to Mr. Bramleigh, but he declined. I don't know on what grounds; but he refused to meet me, and we have never seen each other.”
“If I don't greatly mistake, you ought to have met. I hope it may not be yet too late.”
“Ah, but it is! We are en pleine guerre now, and the battle must be fought out. It is he, and not I, would leave the matter to this issue. I was for a compromise; I would have accepted an arrangement; I was unwilling to overthrow a whole family and consign them to ruin. They might have made their own terms with me; but no, they preferred to defy me. They determined I should be a mere pretender. They gave me no alternative; and I fight because there is no retreat open to me.”
“And yet if you knew Bramleigh—”
“Mon cher, he would not give me the chance; he repulsed the offer I made; he would not touch the hand I held out to him.”
“I am told that the judge declared that he never tried a cause where the defendant displayed a more honorable line of conduct.”
“That is all true. Kelson, my lawyer, said that everything they did was straightforward and creditable; but he said, too, don't go near them, don't encourage any acquaintance with them, or some sort of arrangement will be patched up which will leave everything unsettled to another generation—when all may become once more litigated with less light to guide a decision and far less chance of obtaining evidence.”
“Never mind the lawyers, Count, never mind the lawyers. Use your own good sense, and your own generous instincts; place yourself—in idea—in Bramleigh's position, and ask yourself could you act more handsomely than he has done? and then bethink you, what is the proper way to meet such conduct.”
“It's all too late for this now; don't ask me why, but take my word for it, it is too late.”
“It's never too late to do the right thing, though it may cost a man some pain to own he is changing his mind.”