Nancy raised her eyes and looked steadily at him.
‘Then I must bear the punishment.’
For a minute Barmby enjoyed her suffering. Of his foreseen effects, this one had come nearest to succeeding. But he was not satisfied; he hoped she would beseech his clemency.
‘The punishment might be very serious. I really can’t say what view my father may take of this deception.’
‘Is there any use in talking about it? I am penniless—that’s all you have to tell me. What else I have to bear, I shall know soon enough.’
‘One thing I must ask. Isn’t your husband in a position to support you?’
‘I can’t answer that. Please to say nothing about my husband.’
Barmby caught at hope. It might be true, as Jessica Morgan believed, that Nancy was forsaken. The man Tarrant might be wealthy enough to disregard her prospects. In that case an assiduous lover, one who, by the exercise of a prudent generosity, had obtained power over the girl, could yet hope for reward. Samuel had as little of the villain in his composition as any Camberwell householder. He cherished no dark designs. But, after the manner of his kind, he was in love with Nancy, and even the long pursuit of a lofty ideal does not render a man proof against the elementary forces of human nature.
‘We will suppose then,’ he said, with a certain cheerfulness, ‘that you have nothing whatever to depend upon but your father’s will. What is before you? How can you live?’
‘That is my own affair.’