Keene had expected some such answer, and it did not greatly disconcert him. After pausing a second or two he said,
“I did not ask you for your decision without meaning to abide by it. But it would be well to pause before you make it final. Remember—we shall not part for days, or months, if you send me away now. At least, you need not fear persecution. Yet it is difficult to reconcile one’s self to banishment. Will you not give me a chance of making amends for the folly you complain of? I can not promise that my words shall always be guarded, and my manner artificial; but I think I would rather keep your friendship than win the love of any living woman, and I would try hard never to offend you. Let us finish this at once. You have only to say ‘leave me,’ and I swear that you shall be obeyed to the letter.”
On that last card hung all the issue of the game that he would have sold his soul to win; yet he spoke not eagerly, though very earnestly, and waited quietly for her reply, with a face as calm as death.
Cecil ought not to have hesitated for an instant: we all know that. But steady resolve and stoical self-denial, easy enough in theory, are often bitterly hard in practice. It is very well to preach to the wayfarer that his duty is to go forward and not tarry. But fresh and green grow the grasses round the Diamond of the Desert; pleasantly over its bright waters droop the feathery palms. How drearily the gray arid sand stretches away to the sky-line! Who knows how far it may be to the next oasis? Let us rest yet another hour by the fountain.
From any deliberate intention to do wrong Cecil was as pure as any canonized saint in the roll of virgins and martyrs; but if she had been a voluptuary as elaborate as La Pompadour, she could not have felt more keenly that her love had increased tenfold in intensity since it became a crime to indulge it. The passionate energy that had slumbered so long in her temperament was thoroughly roused at last, and would make itself heard clamorously enough to drown the still small voice, that said “beware and forbear.” Her principles were good, but they were not strong enough to hold their own. O pride of the Tresilyans! that had tempted to sin so many of that haughty house, when you might have saved its fairest descendant, was it the time to falter and fail? She looked up piteously in her great extremity; there was a prayer for help in her eyes, but between them and heaven was interposed a stern bronze face, not a line of it softening.
At length the faint, broken whisper came—“God help me! I can not say it.”
There was a pause, but not a stillness, for the beating of her companion’s heart was distinctly audible. Then Cecil spoke again in her own natural caressing tones:
“You will be good and generous, I know. See how I trust you!”
The thought of how their continued intimacy might touch her fair fame never seemed to suggest itself for an instant. Yet, remember, The Tresilyan was no longer a guileless, romantic girl, believing and hoping all things; she knew right well what scandals and jealousies lurk under the smooth surface of the society in which she had borne so prominent a part; she knew that there were women alive who would have given half their diamonds to have her at their mercy, and torment her at their will. Was it likely that such would let even a slander sleep? Let the Rosière of last season lay this reflection to her heart to temper the immoderation of triumph—“For every one of my victories I have made one mortal enemy.” Not only while in supremacy is the potentate obnoxious to conspiracies; the dagger is most to be dreaded when the dignity is laid down. All dethroned and abdicating dictators have not the luck of Sylla.
Silently and unreservedly to accept such a sacrifice, while the offerer was resolved not to count the cost, transcended even the cynicism of Royston Keene. He grasped her arm as though to arrest her attention, and almost involuntarily broke from his lips words of solemn warning.