“He has never given me any reason, yet I have my own idea about his motive.”
“And what is your idea?”
“Have you ever heard of a man trying to live down a hopeless attachment—trying to medicine a mind diseased with the strong physic of intellectual labour. That is my case, Juanita; and I am inclined to think that it may be Ramsay’s case too. He has altered curiously within the last few months. I cannot get so near his inner-self as I used to get; but I know him well enough to form a shrewd opinion.”
“I am sorry for you both,” she said, with a little nervous laugh, still hiding her face against the baby’s incipient curls and wrinkled pink skin. “I am sorry you should be so sentimental.”
“Sentimental, Nita! Is it sentimental to cherish one love for the best part of a lifetime, knowing that love to be hopeless all the time? If that is your idea of sentimentality, I confess myself sentimental. I have loved you ever since I knew the meaning of the word love—and I have gone on loving you in spite of every discouragement. I loved you when your love was given to another. Yes, I stood aside and harboured not one malevolent thought against the man you had so blest and honoured. I have loved you in your sorrow, as I loved you years ago in your light-hearted girlhood. I shall love you till I am dust; but I know that my love is hopeless. Your very kindness—in its level uniformity of sweetness—has told me that.”
“Dear Theodore, if you knew how I value you—how I admire and respect you—I think you would be content to accept my sisterly regard”, she said, looking up at him with tearful eyes. “Perhaps, had we met differently, as strangers, I might have felt differently—but from my earliest remembrance you have been to me as a friend and brother. I cannot teach myself any other love.”
“Ah, Nita, that other love comes untaught. You want no teaching to love Cuthbert Ramsay. Don’t be angry! I can’t help speaking of that which has been in my mind so long. I saw my doom in your face when Cuthbert was here. I saw that he could interest you as I had never interested you. I saw that he brought fresh thoughts and fancies into your life. I saw that he could conquer where I was beaten.”
“You have no right to say that.”
“I have the right that goes with conviction, Juanita, and with disinterested love. I have the right of my loyal friendship for the man who has shown himself loyal to me. Unless you or I make some sign to prevent him, Cuthbert Ramsay will have made himself an exile from this country before the new year is a month old.”
“What do you mean, Theodore?”