“It is true,” she said with a sigh. “I knew that it would come, those dreadful things always do—and it was not my fault—I am sure you will always remember that. I had to do it—he advanced the money on the express condition, and even if I could pay back the money, I suppose that I should be bound to carry out the bargain. It is not the money which he wants but his bond.”
“Curse him for a Shylock,” said Harold again, and groaned in his bitterness and jealousy.
“Is there nothing to be done?” he asked presently in a harsh voice, for he was very hard hit.
“Nothing,” she answered sadly. “I do not see what can help us, unless the man died,” she said; “and that is not likely. Harold,” she went on, addressing him for the first time in her life by his Christian name, for she felt that after crying upon a man’s shoulder it is ridiculous to scruple about calling him by his name; “Harold, there is no help for it. I did it myself, remember, because, as I told you, I do not think that any one woman has a right to place her individual happiness before the welfare of her family. And I am only sorry,” she added, her voice breaking a little, “that what I have done should bring suffering upon you.”
He groaned again, but said nothing.
“We must try to forget,” she went on wildly. “Oh no! no! I feel it is not possible that we should forget. You won’t forget me, Harold, will you? And though it must be all over between us, and we must never speak like this again—never—you will always know I have not forgotten you, will you not, but that I think of you always?”
“There is no fear of my forgetting,” he said, “and I am selfish enough to hope that you will think of me at times, Ida.”
“Yes, indeed I will. We all have our burdens to bear. It is a hard world, and we must bear them. And it will all be the same in the end, in just a few years. I daresay these dead people here have felt as we feel, and how quiet they are! And perhaps there may be something beyond, where things are not so. Who can say? You won’t go away from this place, Harold, will you? Not until I am married at any rate; perhaps you had better go then. Say that you won’t go till then, and you will let me see you sometimes; it is a comfort to see you.”
“I should have gone, certainly,” he said; “to New Zealand probably, but if you wish it I will stop for the present.”
“Thank you; and now good-bye, my dear, good-bye! No, don’t come with me, I can find my own way home. And—why do you wait? Good-bye, good-bye for ever in this way. Yes, kiss me once and swear that you will never forget me. Marry if you wish to; but don’t forget me, Harold. Forgive me for speaking so plainly, but I speak as one about to die to you, and I wish things to be clear.”