“And that is how you think of me on account of what I have done?” said she.
“How can I think anything else?” he cried. “I told you that I loved you because you were so unlike others—because you were like a child for timidity and innocence of the world. I told you on that last evening we were together how greatly I admired the act of Miss Linley in turning her back upon the platform where she had sung and vowing never to return to it—that was what I told you I loved—I who have seen how the nature—the womanly charm of every woman suffers by reason of her appealing to the public for money—for applause. That beautiful creature forsook the platform before it was too late—before the evil influence could work her ruin. But you—what do I hear the day I return to England?—you have put your heart—your soul, into a book that causes your name to be tossed about from mouth to mouth—Fanny Burney—Fanny Burney—Fanny Burney—I hear that name, which I regarded as sacred, spoken as freely as men speak the name of their Kitty Fisher—their Polly Kennedy—their Fanny Abington! These are public characters—so are you—oh, my God! so are you. You should have heard how you were discussed in that room behind us before you arrived to-day—that gross man Johnson—he called you by a dozen pet names as if he had a right—‘Fan’—‘Fannikin’—I know not what—‘a shy rogue’—that was another! They laughed! They did not see the degradation of it. You were a toy of the public—the vulgar crowd! Ah, you saw how that gross man, who fed himself as a wolf, tucked you under his arm and the others only smiled! Oh, I was shocked—shocked!”
“And I felt proud—prouder than I have felt in my life,” said she. “But now I see what I have lost—forfeited. Listen to me and I will tell you what my dream was. I had written that book, but I had no hope of printing it until I met you and heard from your lips—all that I heard.”
“It was the truth—then: I loved you—then.”
“I knew that it was the truth. But who was I that I should be beloved by you? I felt that it would be unendurable to me to hear people refer to us—as I knew they would—the great singer who had stooped to a nonentity.”
“Ah! that was the charm!”
“Who except you would have said so? I knew what they would say, and I made up my mind that I would not go to you except as an equal. I wanted you to marry someone of whom you would feel proud, and I thought that I had a little gift which I would lay at your feet. I did my best to perfect it for your sake; but even when the book was printed I would not give you my promise until I had assured myself that the gift would be pronounced worthy of your acceptance. That was why I put you off for so many months.”
“Ah, that was your mystery—you called it a mystery.”
“That was my secret—my mystery. Never mind; I thought that my hope was realized when everyone about me was talking of the book and when people whose opinion was valuable had said it was good—my one thought, God knows, was that I could go to you—that I could make you happy, since I should be thought by the world to be in some measure at least, worthy of you.”