Her Ladyship made no reply, and he went on, half as though speaking to himself: “The place is in great beauty just now. I don't think I ever saw it looking so well. Shall I ever see it again?” muttered he, in a still lower tone.
“I really cannot think it ought to break your heart, Mr. Martin, if I were to say 'No' to that question,” said she, testily.
“No—no!” exclaimed he, repeating the word after her; “not come back here!”
“There is nothing to prevent us if we should feel disposed to do so,” replied she, calmly. “I only observed that one could face the alternative with a good courage. The twenty years we have passed in this spot are represented to your mind by more leafy trees and better timber. To me they are written in the dreary memory of a joyless, weary existence. I detest the place,” cried she, passionately, “and for nothing more, that even on leaving it my spirits are too jaded and broken to feel the happiness that they ought.”
Martin sighed heavily, but did not utter a word.
“So it is,” resumed she; “one ever takes these resolutions too late. What we are doing now should have been done sixteen or eighteen years ago.”
“Or not at all,” muttered Martin, but in a voice not meant to be overheard.
“I don't think so, sir,” cried she, catching up his words; “if only as our protest against the insolence and ingratitude of this neighborhood,—of these creatures who have actually been maintained by us! It was high time to show them their real condition, and to what they will be reduced when the influence of our position is withdrawn.”
“If it were only for that we are going away—” And he stopped himself as he got thus far.
“In itself a good and sufficient reason, sir; but I trust there are others also. I should hope that we have paid our debt to patriotism, and that a family who have endured twenty years of banishment may return, if only to take a passing glance at the world of civilization and refinement.”