"That is a hard saying, Christabel. Half a year ago I asked you a question, and you said no. Many a man in my position would have been too proud to run the risk of a second refusal. He would have gone away in a huff and found comfort somewhere else. But I knew that there was only one woman in the world who could make me happy, and I waited for her. You must own that I have been patient, have I not, Belle?"
"You have been very devoted to your dear mother—very good to me. I cannot deny that, Leonard," Christabel answered gravely.
She had dried her tears, and lifted her head from the dog's neck, and sat looking straight at the fire, self-possessed and sad. It seemed to her as if all possibility of happiness had gone out of her life.
"Am I to have no reward?" asked Leonard. "You know with what hope I have waited—you know that our marriage would make my mother happy, that it would make the end of her life a festival. You owe me nothing, but you owe her something. That is sueing in formâ pauperis, isn't it, Belle? But I have no pride where you are concerned."
"You ask me to be your wife; you don't even ask if I love you," said Christabel, bitterly. "What if I were to say yes, and then tell you afterwards that my heart still belongs to Angus Hamleigh."
"You had better tell me that now, if it is so," said Leonard, his face darkening in the firelight.
"Then I will tell you that it is so. I gave him up because I thought it my duty to give him up. I believed that in honour he belonged to another woman. I believe so still. But I have never left off loving him. That is why I have made up my mind never to marry."
"You are wise," retorted Leonard, "such a confession as that would settle for most men. But it does not settle for me, Belle. I am too far gone. If you are a fool about Hamleigh, I am a fool about you. Only say you will marry me, and I will take my chance of all the rest. I know you will be a good wife; and I will be a good husband to you. And I suppose in the end you will get to care for me, a little. One thing is certain, that I can't be happy without you; so I would gladly run the risk of an occasional taste of misery with you. Come, Belle, is it a bargain," he pleaded, taking her unresisting hands. "Say that it is, dearest. Let me kiss the future mistress of Mount Royal."
He bent over her and kissed her—kissed those lips which had once been sacred to Angus Hamleigh, which she had sworn in her heart should be kissed by no other man upon earth. She recoiled from him with a shiver of disgust—no good omen for their wedded bliss.
"This will make our mother very happy," said Leonard. "Come to her now, Belle, and let us tell her."