"That is quite easy for me to believe," replied Dormer; but he seemed to have a slight difficulty in speaking.
"The end came a week ago," pursued Horatia. And she explained, as shortly as she could, the bombshell which the Dowager Duchesse had cast into her plans, finishing by saying, "I felt almost confident that Tristram only waited for some sign from me ... and yet I could not bring myself to give it. But time was pressing, and I must decide about the boy. My father urged me to send the letter I had received to Tristram, and to ask his advice. It ... it was ... unusual, I know ... but I did so—and this morning I received his answer. I think you had better read it."
Dormer got up and took with obvious reluctance the paper which she held out to him. He read it, flushed violently, and became very pale.
"I don't want you to say anything," said Horatia hurriedly. "When I got this letter this morning I saw it all in a flash. It has only needed your hesitation to make me quite sure that I was right. From time to time I have heard the views of his friends here at Oriel about the marriage of the clergy, but somehow—it was stupid of me—it never occurred to me that he shared them. But that of course is the key to the situation. He is bound by some vow not to marry."
Her hearer during this speech had stationed himself by the fire, his head bent, with a hand on the high mantelshelf; his arm, in consequence, hid his face. She could not even see it now, as he said, in a voice noticeably less hostile. "There I think you are wrong. As I see now that it is quite unnecessary for me to keep anything from you, I can tell you that, to my knowledge, he has never taken any kind of vow, but that, even before his ordination as priest, he had a solemn intention to embrace the life of sacrifice to the glory of God. But it was a solemn intention, not a vow."
"Intention or vow," returned Horatia, "it would be all the same to Tristram. And please do not speak to me of sacrifice and the glory of God! I do not believe that the Creator is glorified by the self-inflicted suffering of His creatures. But if you speak to me of Tristram's happiness, or of his conscience, which is more than happiness to him, then I can understand you."
"You are right about Tristram's conscience," said Tristram's friend.
"Yet I believe that I can still bring him back to me if I choose to," said Horatia rather defiantly. The challenge drew from Charles Dormer a bow which was more eloquent than many words.
"But I do not mean to try," she finished. "I am quite sure that Tristram is deluded, yet if this delusion has become a matter of conscience with him, he would not long remain happy with me. What I want to find out is how firmly he is fixed in this idea, and how he would look at his action later on if he married me. This is where you can help me, Mr. Dormer, for I know that you are his second self. In the end he would come to think as you think now. I want you to tell me, first, if in your opinion it would ever be right to go back upon what you call a solemn intention?"
Dormer saw now that he was being forced into the position which he had a short time ago rejected almost with regret—that of an executioner. Now, strangely enough, he hated it.