There was a long silence.
'About your wish,' asked Sylvia at length, 'you are not at all doubtful?'
'Not for one moment.—Whether I err in my judgment of him could be proved only by time; but I know that if I were free, if I stood alone'——
She broke off and sighed. 'It would mean, I suppose,' said the other, 'a rupture with your family?'
'Father would not abandon me, but I should darken the close of his life. Buckland would utterly cast me off; mother would wish to do so.—You see, I cannot think and act simply as a woman, as a human being. I am bound to a certain sphere of life. The fact that I have outgrown it, counts for nothing. I cannot free myself without injury to people whom I love. To act as I wish would be to outrage every rule and prejudice of the society to which I belong. You yourself—you know how you would regard me.'
Sylvia replied deliberately.
'I am seeing you in a new light, Sidwell. It takes a little time to reconstruct my conception of you.'
'You think worse of me than you did.'
'Neither better nor worse, but differently. There has been too much reserve between us. After so long a friendship, I ought to have known you more thoroughly. To tell the truth, I have thought now and then of you and Mr. Peak; that was inevitable. But I went astray; it seemed to me the most unlikely thing that you should regard him with more than a doubtful interest. I knew, of course, that he had made you his ideal, and I felt sorry for him.'
'I seemed to you unworthy?'——