‘But with time!’ exclaimed Lord St. Erme, in broken words. ‘May I not hope that time and earnest endeavours—?’
‘Hope nothing,’ said Theodora. ‘Every one would tell you you have had a happy escape.’
‘And is this all? My inspiration!—you who were awakening me to a sense of the greatness of real life—you who would have led me and aided me to a nobler course—’
‘That is open to you, without the evils I should have entailed on you. I could never have returned your feelings, and it would have been misery for both. You will see it, when you come to your senses, and rejoice.’
‘Rejoice! If you knew how the thought of you is entwined in every aspiration, and for life!’
‘Do not talk so,’ said Theodora. ‘It only grieves me to see the pain I have given; but it would be worse not to break off at once.’
‘Must it be so?’ said he, lingering before his fleeting vision.
‘It must. The kindest thing by both of us is to cut this as short as possible.’
‘In that, as in all else, I obey. I know that a vain loiterer, like myself, had little right to hope for notice from one whose mind was bent on the noblest tasks of mankind. You have opened new views to me, and I had dared to hope you would guide me in them; but with you or without you, my life shall be spent in them.’
‘That will be some consolation for the way I have treated you,’ said Theodora.