“Take care of her, Howard. She is worthy, and has been like a daughter to me.”
“I will,” he answered, emphatically, as his hand closed tightly over that of Edith, who felt as if that hand-clasp bound her to the fate which she had no longer power to resist.
Immediately after the funeral she returned to her mother’s cottage, but before she went Col. Schuyler asked for a private interview, which she granted with a feeling that it was of no use to struggle against what was inevitable. Col. Schuyler had tried to forget her during his travels; had tried to reason with himself that a poor unknown girl, who was his sister’s hired companion, was not a fitting match for a Schuyler whose first wife had been a Rossiter. But one thought of the beautiful face, and of the sweet voice which had sung to him in the twilight was sufficient to break down every barrier of pride and make him willing to sacrifice a great deal for the sake of securing her. And so it was that on his return to England he was resolved to renew the offer once made and rejected, and to take no refusal this time. His sister approved his choice, and had sanctioned it with her dying breath, and thus reassured he went to Edith with a feeling of security as to the result of the interview, which manifested itself somewhat in his manner, and made Edith feel more and more how helpless she was, and how certain it was that her secret must be told.
“Edith,” he began in his stiff way, as he took a seat beside her, “just before I left Oakwood last August, I held a conversation with you which I know you have not forgotten. I asked you to be my wife, and you asked me if I loved you. I could not say yes, then, for though I admired and respected, and wanted you, I did not experience any of those ecstatic thrills of which we read in books, and which very young people call love. And even now,”—he paused a moment and hesitated, and a flush spread itself over his face, “even now I may not feel as a younger man would in similar circumstances; but when I tell you that you have scarcely been out of my mind for a moment during my absence, that I have dreamed of you night and day, and that in all the world there is nothing I desire so much as I desire you, I think you will be satisfied that if I do not love you as you have imagined you might be loved, I am in a fair way to do so, if I receive a little encouragement.”
He paused, but Edith did not speak, and sat before him with her long eyelashes cast down and her hands working nervously together. She knew he was sincere, though his wooing was so different from what Abelard’s had been, or what Godfrey’s would be were he in his father’s place. But Godfrey was young, and Abelard had been young, too, and both were different from this cold, proud man of forty, who had unbent his dignity so much, and who seemed so earnest, and even tender as he went on to tell her of all she had to gain if she would go with him to the home he would make more beautiful than it already was, for her sake. It was a very pleasant picture he drew of the future, but it did not move Edith one whit, because she felt certain that this life could not be hers if she told him all, as she must surely tell him, if he persisted in his suit. She admitted to him that he was not disagreeable to her; that she found his society pleasant; that she believed him to be a man of honor, who would try to make her happy; and when he asked why she hesitated, she opened her lips to tell him, but could not speak the words.
“I can write them better,” she thought, and when she could command her voice, she said to him: “Give me a few days, a week, in which to think, and then I will write you my decision. I know you honor me, and I thank you for it, and believe you sincere, and for that reason, would not for the world deceive you. I have something to tell you which I can better put on paper. Let me go now, for I feel like suffocating.”
She spoke slowly and with difficulty, and her face was so white, that Col. Schuyler felt alarmed lest she should faint, and passing his arm around her, led her to the balcony and brought her a glass of water, and laid his hand softly on her hair, and seemed so kind and thoughtful, that for the first time there awoke in Edith’s heart a throb of something like affection for this man who might make her so happy.
“Oh, if I only could forget the past and accept the life offered me,” she thought, as an hour later he put her into the carriage which was to take her to her mother’s, and then pressing her hand deferentially, said to her: “I shall await your answer with a great deal of impatience, and shall not consent to receive an unfavorable one.”
He lifted his hat, and the carriage drove away to Caledonia Street, where her mother was expecting her.