Concerning Isabel Carnaby

by Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler

"I see what you mean; had she chosen poverty you would have made it sweet to her, but you did not feel at liberty to force poverty upon her against her will."

"That was just it," continued Paul; "as long as I saw that my love satisfied her, I knew that I held her happiness in the hollow of my hand, and I was not afraid of poverty for herself or for me; but when I found that she was beginning to shrink from the hard life she had chosen, I felt it was but manly to let her go."

"Do you know I was afraid at one time that you had been hard on her, my dear?"

"So I was at first—hard and bitter and proud; but when love comes on to the scene, pride has to knuckle under and hardness soon melts away. Just at first, I own, my pride held me back from her, because of some things she had said; but I soon forgave her, as I knew she was angry at the time and did not mean them; and I should have forgiven her just the same, even if she had," he added, smiling at himself.

"Do you still care for her?" asked Mrs. Seaton, knitting furiously in her excitement.

"Yes; nothing can ever alter that. Isabel will always be the one woman in the world to me."

"Then why, oh! why didn't you go and tell her so, and beg her to come back to you and let bygones be bygones?"

"I have told you—simply because she was rich and I was poor. If it had been the other way, I would have made her come back to me, and would have held her against the whole world. I could easily have put my own pride into my pocket; but her comfort was a different thing, and could not be so easily disposed of."

"But if she were rich and you were poor, you must remember also that she was a woman and you were a man, and that the first advances should have come from you. The pride of womanhood is a stronger instinct than the pride of poverty," persisted Mrs. Seaton; "and then you must not forget Shams and Shadows"

"I am hardly likely to do so," replied Paul rather bitterly, "at present there seems no necessity for me to keep a book-marker in that excellent work to prevent it from slipping from my memory altogether."