"No; how can it be? That was folly. Lady Lanswell says you have forgotten it. Shall a mere folly be a barrier between us? No; love levels all barriers, you know."
He kissed her hands, saying to himself that he was the greatest coward and the greatest villain that ever stood on earth. Words he had none. Then they heard Lady Cambrey calling for her niece.
"Let me tell her," whispered the beautiful girl; "she will be so pleased, she likes you so much." Then, as they passed out of the court, she looked at the grand old walls. "I shall always love this place," she said, "because it is here that you have first said that you loved me."
And the pity is that every girl and every woman disposed to give her whole chance of happiness in a man's hand was not there to see how women believe men, and how men keep the promises they make.
He told his mother that same night.
"I have done it," he said; "circumstances have forced me into it, but I have forsworn myself. I have lost my self-respect, and I shall never be happy again while I live."
But she embraced him with eager delight.
"You have done well," she said; "you have risen above the shackles of a miserable promise, and have proved yourself a noble man by daring to undo the mad act of folly which might have blighted your life. I approve of what you have done, and so will any other sensible person."
And that was his consolation, his reward for the greatest act of perfidy that man ever committed, or a woman sanctioned.