I felt a sharp and sudden pang of pain, but I said nothing.
"Well!" he impatiently exclaimed.
"May I not write to him?" I replied, feeling that my colour came and went beneath his gaze.
He did not reply. It was plain he would have an entire sacrifice or none. He clasped me so close, that I was obliged to rest my head on his shoulder. As he bent over me, my look met his, and from the gaze I seemed to drink in all the strange and dangerous sweetness of sacrifice.
"Well!" he said again.
"Yes," I answered, "all—anything you like, Cornelius."
I trembled—for my blood rushed to my heart with something like pain and gladness blending in its rapid flow; but he only saw the tears which covered my face, and he exclaimed, with reproachful tenderness:
"You weep because I ask you to give up a childish past, which, childish as it is, I would give anything to annihilate. Oh! Daisy, Daisy!"
At once I checked my tears. He saw the effort, and, stooping, he pressed a long and lingering kiss on my brow.
"Oh! my darling!" he said, ardently, "do not regret it so much. If I will share your friendship with none, is it not because I mean to take on myself the exclusive care of your happiness? Trust in me—in that feeling be a child again. Alas! I sometimes fear that the calmness and serenity of childhood are not merely in your years, but also in your nature. Oh! if, without adding one day to your existence—one dark page to your experience—I could change this!"