"You talked of her when you were ill."
"I'll warrant. But she wouldn't have sat up one night by my bedside, for fear her eyes would be less brilliant for the next evening's ball. She drove me off to the West to make a fortune for her to spend, in case she did not get hold of somebody else's by that time. Do you think I ought to make it for her?"
There was no answer. His companion's head was drooping. He lifted one of her hands, as he went on:
"I was so dazzled by her magnificence that, for a long time, I could see nothing in its true light. But my vision is clear now. Virginia shall never have my fortune to spend, nor me to twist around her jeweled finger."
The hand he held began to tremble.
"Now, little Alice, supposing I had told you of such love, and you had professed to answer it, what sacrifices would you have made? Would you have given me that little gold heart you wear about your neck—your only bit of ornamentation?"
"I would have made a sacrifice, full as great in its way, as the decline in pomp and position might have been to the proud lady," she replied, lifting her eyes calmly to his face. "I would have refused the offered happiness if, by accepting it, I thought I should ever, by my ignorance of proprieties, give him cause to blush for me—if I thought my uncultivated tastes would some time disappoint him, that he would grow weary of me as a friend and companion because I was not truly fitted for that place—if I thought I was not worthy of him, I would sacrifice myself, and try to wish only for his best happiness."
Her eyes sank, as she ceased speaking, and the tears which would come into them, gushed over her cheeks.
"Worthy! you are more than worthy of the best man in the world, Alice! far more than worthy of me!" cried Philip, in a rapture he could not restrain. "O Alice, if you only loved me in that fashion!"
"You know that I do," she replied, with that archness so native to her, smiling through her tears.