“Miss Jeffries, won’t you try and care for me? Even if you can not regard me as I would choose, you can at least endeavor to respect me.”
This last was a false move. With this last effrontery her ire and grief found a full vent.
“Dare you sit there and ask me to respect you?” she rung out, in noble wrath. “Dare you, in the name of all that is pure and holy, to ask me to look even pityingly upon you? Oh, sir, if in your mother was a spark of womanly virtue, if your father was a man of worth and honesty, if you ever had a pure sister, think of them and then of yourself at this moment!—think of them and release me from this wicked place. Take me back to my dear home; do not, oh, sir, do not bring down the wrath of Heaven upon you! Think of my poor father—of his anguish at my absence; think of the one who is to be my husband; please, sir, please pity and commiserate me. Oh, if you could imagine my grief and horror at being here, away from my friends, if you could respect or pity my sorrow, you would at once release me. Oh, sir, for the love and in the memory of your mother and sister, please do so, and let me go, and I will never tell of what I have been through here.”
He looked up in his natural expression and said, quietly:
“I will at once release you and take you safely home if you will grant me a single favor. It will not incommode you.”
“Name it!” she said, hastily, with her face lighted by a ray of hope.
“I will. It is to marry me.”
“Marry you!”
She looked at him steadily for a moment, then sunk on the stool with a shudder, wildly weeping.
“What is your answer?” he asked, with a quiet smile.