“But I must marry you, Guida. A sailor’s life is uncertain, and what I want I want now. When I come back from Portsmouth every one shall know, but if you love me—and I know you do—you must marry me to-morrow. Until I come back no one shall know about it except the clergyman, Mr. Dow of St. Michael’s—I have seen him—and Shoreham, a brother officer of mine. Ah, you must, Guida, you must! Whatever is worth doing is better worth doing in the time one’s own heart says. I want it more, a thousand times more, than I ever wanted anything in my life.”
She looked at him in a troubled sort of way. Somehow she felt wiser than he at that moment, wiser and stronger, though she scarcely defined the feeling to herself, though she knew that in the end her brain would yield to her heart in this.
“Would it make you so much happier, Philip?” she said more kindly than joyfully, more in grave acquiescence than delighted belief.
“Yes, on my honour—supremely happy.”
“You are afraid that otherwise, by some chance, you might lose me?” she said it tenderly, yet with a little pain.
“Yes, yes, that is it, Guida dearest,” he replied. “I suppose women are different altogether from men,” she answered. “I could have waited ever so long, believing that you would come again, and that I should never lose you. But men are different; I see, yes, I see that, Philip.”
“We are more impetuous. We know, we sailors, that now-to-day-is our time; that to-morrow may be Fate’s, and Fate is a fickle jade: she beckons you up with one hand to-day, and waves you down with the other to-morrow.”
“Philip,” she said, scarcely above a whisper, and putting her hands on his arms, as her head sank towards him, “I must be honest with you—I must be that or nothing at all. I do not feel as you do about it; I can’t. I would much—much—rather everybody knew. And I feel it almost wrong that they do not.” She paused a minute, her brow clouded slightly, then cleared again, and she went on bravely: “Philip, if—if I should, you must promise me that you will leave me as soon as ever we are married, and that you will not try to see me until you come again from Portsmouth. I am sure that is right, for the deception will not be so great. I should be better able then to tell the poor grandpethe. Will you promise me, Philip-dear? It—it is so hard for me. Ah, can’t you understand?”
This hopeless everlasting cry of a woman’s soul!
He clasped her close. “Yes, Guida, my beloved, I understand, and I promise you—I do promise you.” Her head dropped on his breast, her arms ran round his neck. He raised her face; her eyes were closed; they were dropping tears. He tenderly kissed the tears away.