"I can not tell you," she stammered, and he saw her little white hands wrung together in agony. "Oh, Lionel, trust me—do not be angry with me."
"You can not expect me," he said, although he was softened by the sight of her sorrow, "to know of such an action and not to speak of it, Lillian. If you can explain it, do so. If the man was an old lover of yours, tell me so; in time I may forget the deceit, if you are frank with me now. If there be any circumstance that extenuates or explains what you did, tell it to me now."
"I can not," she said, and her fair face drooped sadly away from him.
"That I quite believe," he continued, bitterly. "You can not and will not. You know the alternative, I suppose?"
The gentle eyes were raised to his in mute, appealing sorrow, but she spoke not.
"Tell me now," he said, "whom it was you stole out of the house to meet—why you met him? Be frank with me; and, if it was but girlish nonsense, in time I may pardon you. If you refuse to tell me, I shall leave Earlescourt, and never look upon your false, fair face again."
She buried her face in her hands, and he heard a low moan of sorrow come from her white lips.
"Will you tell me, Lillian?" he asked again—and he never forgot the deadly anguish of the face turned toward him.
"I can not," she replied; her voice died away, and he thought she was falling from her chair.
"That is your final decision; you refuse to tell me what, as your accepted lover, I have a right to know?"