“But she cannot have any claim on you,” said Dolores, with a more shocked look and tone than the words conveyed.
“Not she—in reason; but the worst of it is, Dolores, that the wretched woman avers that she deceived my father, and had an old rascally tyrant of an Italian husband, who might have been alive when she married.”
“Gerald!”
Dolores stood still and looked at him with her eyes opened in horror.
“Yes, you may well say Gerald. ‘Tis the only name I have a right to if this is true.”
“But you are still yourself,” and she held out her hand.
He did not take it, however, only saying—
“You know what this means?”
“Of course I do, but that does not alter you—yourself in yourself.”
“If you say that, Dolores, it will only alter me to make me—more—more myself.”