“Then why, why did you betray me, Evan? I know it all. But if you blackened yourself to me, was it not because you loved something better than me? And now you think me false! Which of us two has been false? It’s silly to talk of these things now too late! But be just. I wish that we may be friends. Can we, unless you bend a little?”
The tears streamed down her cheeks, and in her lovely humility he saw the baseness of that pride of his which had hitherto held him up.
“Now that you are in this house where I was born and am to live, can you regret what has come between us, Rose?”
Her lips quivered in pain.
“Can I do anything else but regret it all my life, Evan?”
How was it possible for him to keep his strength?
“Rose!” he spoke with a passion that made her shrink, “are you bound to this man?” and to the drooping of her eyes, “No. Impossible, for you do not love him. Break it. Break the engagement you cannot fulfil. Break it and belong to me. It sounds ill for me to say that in such a place. But Rose, I will leave it. I will accept any assistance that your father—that any man will give me. Beloved—noble girl! I see my falseness to you, though I little thought it at the time—fool that I was! Be my help, my guide—as the soul of my body! Be mine!”
“Oh, Evan!” she clasped her hands in terror at the change in him, that was hurrying her she knew not whither, and trembling, held them supplicatingly.
“Yes, Rose: you have taught me what love can be. You cannot marry that man.”
“But, my honour, Evan! No. I do not love him; for I can love but one. He has my pledge. Can I break it?”