"I am willing," said Huriel, "but you will please to remember one thing. I will stand no more fault-finding, whether in jest or earnest. If I overlook the past, my good-nature does not go so far as to allow any more of it."
"What do you mean by that?" demanded Joseph, whose bile interfered with his memory.
"I forbid you to ask," said the Head-Woodsman, "and I command you to bethink yourself. If you fight my son you will be none the more innocent for that, and it will not add to your credit if I withdraw the forgiveness which, without a word of explanation, my heart has already granted you."
"Master!" cried Joseph, hot with excitement, "if you think you have anything to forgive I thank you for your forgiveness; but, in my opinion, I have done you no wrong. I never dreamed of deceiving you; and if your daughter had said yes, I should not have backed down from my offer. She is a girl without an equal for sense and uprightness; I should have loved her, ill or well, but at any rate sincerely and without betraying her. She might perhaps have saved me from much evil and much suffering; but she did not think me worthy of her. Therefore I am at liberty to court whom I will; and I consider that the man I trusted and who promised me his help has made haste to take advantage of my momentary pique to supplant me."
"Your momentary pique lasted a month, Joseph," said Huriel; "be fair about it,—one month, during which you asked my sister in marriage three times. I am forced to believe that you held her in derision; if you wish to clear yourself of that insult you must admit that I was not to blame in the matter. I believed your word; that is the only wrong I have done; don't give me reason to think it is one I must repent of."
Joseph kept silence; then, rising, he said, "Yes, you are good at argument; you are both cleverer than I at that; I have spoken and acted like a man who does not know what he wants; but you are greater fools than I if you don't know that, without being mad, we may wish for two opposite things. Leave me to be what I am, and I will leave you to be what you wish to be. If your heart is honest, Huriel, I shall soon know it, and if you win the game fairly, I will do you justice and withdraw without resentment."
"How can you tell if my heart is honest when you have been unable to judge it rightly hitherto??
"I can tell by what you now say of me to Brulette," replied Joseph. "You are in a position to prejudice her against me and I cannot do the same by you."
"Stop!" I said to Joseph, "don't blame any one unjustly. Thérence has already told Brulette that you asked her in marriage not a fortnight ago."
"But nothing further has been or will be told," added Huriel; "Joseph, we are better than you think us. We do not want to deprive you of Brulette's friendship."