"Charley, all this is nonsense, and you know it. We are cousins—we are good friends and stanch comrades, and always will be, I hope; but lovers—no, no, no!"
"And why?" he asks.
"Have I not told you already—told you over and over again? If you don't despise me, and think me heartless and base, the fault has not been my want of candor. My cynicisms I mean, every word. If you had your father's wealth, the fortune he means to leave you, I would marry you to-morrow, and be," her lips trembled a little, "the happiest girl on earth."
"You don't care for me at all, then?" he calmly asks.
"Care for you! O Charley! can't you see? I am not all selfish. I care for you so much that I would sooner die than marry you. For you a marriage with me means ruin—nothing else."
"My father is fond of me. I am his only son. He would relent."
"He never would," she answered firmly, "and you know it. Charley, the day he spoke to you in Cork, I was behind the window-curtains reading. I heard every word. My first impulse was to come out and confront him—to throw back his favors and patronage, and demand to be sent home. A horrid bad temper is numbered among the list of my failings. But I did not. I heard your calm reply—the 'soft answer that turneth away wrath,' and it fell like oil on my troubled spirit.
"'Don't lose your temper,' you said; 'Fred Darrell's daughter and I won't marry, if that's what you mean.'
"I admire your prudence and truth. I took the lesson home, and—stayed behind the curtains. And we will keep to that—you and Fred Darrell's daughter will never marry."
"But, Edith, you know what I meant. Good Heavens! you don't for a second suppose—"