“I will tell you all—all that I may tell, sir.'Tis not much to tell, but it means a great deal to me. In brief, Mr. Wesley, a year ago I was at Bristol and there I met a worthy man, who asked me to marry him. I felt then that I loved him so truly that 'twould be impossible for me ever to change, and so I gave him my promise. I had been ofttimes wooed before, but because my heart had never been touched the neighbours all affirmed that I had the hardest heart of any maiden in the Port. They may have been right; but, hard-hearted or not, I believed that I loved this man, and he sailed away satisfied that I would be true to him.”
“He was a mariner?”
“He is a master-mariner, and his ship is a fine one. He sailed for the China Seas, and 'twas agreed that after his long voyage we were to be married. That was, I say, a year ago, and I was true to him until——”
She faltered, she gave him a look that he could not understand, and then all at once she flung herself down on the short coarse herbage of the cliff, and began to weep with her hands over her face.
He strove to soothe her and comfort her, saying she had done naught that was wrong—giving her assurance that a way out of her trouble would surely he found if she told him all.
“What am I to do?” she cried, looking piteously up to him, with shining eyes. “What am I to do? I got a letter from him only on Friday last, telling me that he had had a prosperous voyage and had just brought his ship safe to Bristol, and that he meant to come to me without delay. Oh, sir, 'twas only when I had that letter I found that I no longer loved him as I did a year ago.”
“Is there another man who has come between you, my child?” he asked gravely.
“Heaven help me! there is another,” she faltered.
“And does he know that you are bound by a promise to someone else? If so, believe me he is a dishonourable man, and you must dismiss him from your thought,” said he.
She shook her head.