“And if she brings an action for breach of promise?”
“Then she loses the cloak which has so far covered her natural want of delicacy.”
“You are as hard and didactic as ever.”
“I’m not hard; but I have a few gleams of sense left shining through the mass of cobwebs with which you have filled my head.”
“I don’t understand the simile.”
“Well, I’m in love with you; I love you so much that I’d rather come to you without a rag of honor left than be saluted as the noblest man in the world by any other woman. Just as you, who know that Rees has turned out such a scamp that we daren’t inquire into his actions, would think nothing of lowering yourself to the point of forgiving him.”
Deborah got up and touched the bell for tea, too much agitated to answer him. Godwin had not only spoken to her with less reserve than ever before, but had looked at her with passion, and finally poured out his words with a vehemence quite in sharp contrast with his accustomed matter-of-fact manner.
“Well,” said he, rising quickly and leaning over her as she rang the bell; “do you think more of me now than you did before?”
“No. Less,” she answered sharply.
But it was not true. No woman thinks less of a man for letting her into the secrets of his innermost feelings. Godwin retreated, however, without guessing this, and made no further reference to their conversation until the following morning, when he was on the point of starting on his journey back to his work.