“I thought the engagement was broken off,” observed Rose.
“Ay, but it’s on again,” resumed Frere. “I met a man yesterday who is one of Bellefield’s intimates, and he told me that his lordship was staying at Broadhurst—that he has made up his feud with the General, and that the engagement has been, formally renewed.”
“Now, then, I see it all,” exclaimed Rose. “Poor Lewis has been long struggling against a deep attachment for that sweet Annie, whom none could know without loving; nourishing, perhaps half-unconsciously, a secret hope that she was not wholly indifferent to him—a hope which to an honourable mind like his must have brought more pain than pleasure. And now this renewal of the engagement must have proved to him how entirely he was mistaken; and unable to witness his rival’s triumph, he has, as he tells me, fled the spot where each kind word from Annie, and every haughty glance from Lord Bellefield, would have been like a dagger to his heart. No wonder the mental conflict has nearly maddened him—my poor, poor Lewis!”
Preoccupied by her sympathy for her brother’s sorrow, Rose did not observe the effect her words had produced upon Frere; nor was it till he spoke in a low, deep voice, which trembled with suppressed feeling, that she observed his emotion.
“Ay,” he said, more as if communing with his own spirit than as though he were addressing her, “Ay, it must be a hard thing to love with all the depth of such a passionate nature as Lewis’s one who is indifferent to him; but it is a more bitter thing still to see the long years gliding by, and to pass from boyhood to youth, from youth to manhood, and to find middle age stealing quickly upon you, and never to have had any human being to love you—never to have found any heart on which you might pour out those riches of affection which every generous nature pants to bestow.” He paused—then, as the recollections he had excited seemed to crowd upon him, continued, “Oh, the bitter tears I have shed when, scarcely more than a child, I have wept to hear other boys tell of happy homes, and a mother’s love, and the affection of brothers and sisters; then came the silent but more enduring sorrow of youth, when tears can no longer form a vent for the heart’s isolation, and the restless spirit preys upon itself; and last, the struggle of maturer manhood, which in its meridian strength contends against the sorrows of its weaker morning, and strives to live down the fruitless longing for that affection which it cannot attain, and conquering all but the one abiding grief, remains to own itself still lonely-hearted, and sees its only hope of comfort in the grave. Ay, this is grief which the help of God alone can enable one to endure.”
The deep feeling, the simple, manly pathos with which he spoke were more than Rose or any true woman could hear unmoved. Laying her hand on his to attract his attention, she said in a sweet, gentle voice, “Indeed, Mr. Frere, you do your friends injustice. Lewis loves you as a brother; my dear father had the warmest affection for you, and often said that if Lewis did but resemble you, if he proved as high-principled, as kind-hearted, and as persevering, his dearest wishes would be fulfilled: even I myself——” she paused, glancing timidly at her companion; but as he remained with his hand pressed upon his brow, apparently buried in abstraction, she gathered courage, and continued—
“Even I feel that in you God has given me a second brother, and that I should be most ungrateful, most unworthy such disinterested kindness as you have invariably shown me, did I not feel the warmest esteem and—and—gratitude——”
And here, suddenly becoming aware that Frere’s beautiful eyes were fixed upon her with the same peculiar expression of delight which she had once before observed in them, on the occasion of his telling her how he had convinced Rasper the irascible of the evil of duelling, poor Rose’s eloquence failed her, and she became abruptly silent. Frere paused for a moment, and then with a forced calmness which scarcely veiled the depth of his emotion, said—
“Dear Rose, forgive me if I am about to cause you pain; but your kindness has afforded me a vision of such exquisite happiness that it would be a source of endless self-reproach to me if through any reserve on my part I failed to realise it. Rose, you cannot be my sister, but you can, if you will, hold a far dearer title—you can become my honoured wife. I have loved you long, although it was my sorrow at your departure from London which first opened my eyes to the nature of my feelings. Since then my sense of my own unworthiness to aspire to the joy of possessing such an angel has alone kept me silent. Rose, I know my own presumption in thus addressing you; I am aware only too painfully of my own uncouthness, my deficiency in all the polished conventionalities of life; but if the deepest, tenderest devotion of a heart which has pined through a lifetime for some object on which to pour forth its treasure of love can make you happy; if you think that in time you could in some degree return my affection——”
“Oh, hush, hush!” interrupted Rose, in a broken, faltering voice; “I cannot bear to hear you speak thus! If, good and noble as you are, my love can indeed make you happier-”