‘You will at least tell me one thing, Lizzie. You know to whom this child belongs, do you not? I ask it in your own interests.’
‘I do.’
‘Then go to them, my dear, and tell them the dilemma in which the promise you have given on their account has placed you. Ask them to release you from it. Surely no one could be so inhuman as to desire their shame (for I presume shame is at the bottom of this mystery) to spoil the life of an innocent woman? Oh! if I only knew their names myself, I would proclaim them far and wide, until I forced them to release you from this cruel bondage.’
‘It is impossible, Captain Norris!’
‘Impossible for you to go to them?’
‘Impossible that my going could do any good in the matter. I cannot rid myself of the blame, without shifting it on the shoulders of another, and that my oath forbids me to do. Pray leave me, Captain Norris. Leave me to bear it as best I may—alone! You heard what Mr Courtney has kindly proposed,—that I shall live on here, and continue my dear father’s work. I mean to do so, and if God spares the child, it shall live with me. The coloured people will not despise us. They have too many of such cases amongst themselves, and for the rest, I am strong enough to suffer without sinking under it.’
‘But not alone, dear Lizzie!’ exclaimed Hugh Norris, taking her hand. ‘If your engagement to Monsieur de Courcelles is indeed broken off, let me speak again. You would not listen to me last week on his account; listen to me now on your own. Come to me, and let me fight the battle of life for all three of us—you and me and the child. If it were really your child, Lizzie, I should say the same. When I told you I loved you, I did not mean that I loved some ideal creature raised from my own imagination, but you—yourself, with all your faults (if you have faults) and follies (which cannot be greater than my own), and am willing to condone everything, for the privilege of loving you. Let me try to make you forget this sorrow. In England, amidst new scenes and new friends, you may learn to feel differently, even towards me, and look back on San Diego as a bad dream, that has passed away for ever.’
Lizzie pressed his hand gratefully.
‘How good you are to me,’ she answered, ‘and how true! I am sure you will make the best and most loving of husbands, and some woman will be very happy with you. But that woman will not be me! I would not wrong you, my dear friend, by accepting your generous proposal. Why should I cast this shadow over your honourable life, or profess to offer you a heart not worthy of your acceptance? I love Henri de Courcelles! Ah! don’t shrink from me. I know he is unworthy and unjust, nor can I believe he has ever really cared for me; but he managed to win my love, and I cannot take it back from him so suddenly. By-and-by, perhaps, when this wound is somewhat healed, and time has enabled me to see more clearly, I shall be strong enough to shake off the fascination that enthralls me; but just now, I can only weep over its decay, as I weep over the grave of my lost father. And so you see how utterly unworthy I am of the noble offer you have made me.’
‘Not in my eyes,’ persisted Hugh Norris. ‘I can never think of you but as the dearest and most self-sacrificing of women, and I shall keep the place in my heart open for you to my life’s end. But I will worry you no further now. Only say if I can do anything for you, Lizzie, before I go.’