“I know not how it is, Francis, but you seem to me Francis no longer—quite another person. I cannot tell how the love has gone, but it is gone; as completely as if it had never existed. Sometimes I was afraid if I saw you it might come back again; but I have seen you, and it is not there. It never can return again any more.”
“And so, from henceforth, I am no more to you than any stranger in the street?”
“I did not say that—it would not be true. Nothing you do, will ever be indifferent to me. If you do wrong—oh, Francis, it hurts me so! it will hurt me to the day of my death. I care little for your being very prosperous, or very happy, possibly no one is happy; but I want you to be good. We were young together, and I was very proud of you:—let me be proud of you again as we grow old.”
“And yet you will not marry me?”
“No, for I do not love you; and never could again, no more than I could love another woman's husband. Francis,” speaking almost in a whisper; “you know as well as I do, that there is one person and only one, whom you ought to marry.”
He shrank back, and for the second time—the first being when I found him with his boy in his arms—Francis turned scarlet with honest shame.
“Is it you—is it Penelope Johnston who can say this?”
“It is Penelope Johnston.”
“And you say it to me?”
“To you.”