“It is not going to make you happy to hanker after a married woman. It will make you wicked. You will begin to wish in your own heart that he would—die! It would be like committing a murder in your heart. We are taught to pray to be delivered from temptation, it would be walking into it deliberately to stay here,—to allow yourself to go on caring... Oh, Dane, wouldn’t it be better for you, wouldn’t it, wouldn’t it, to have me beside you, loving you, helping you, making a home? I don’t say it could be the best thing—the best thing is over—but wouldn’t it, wouldn’t it, be better than loneliness, and wandering, or... sin?”
Peignton looked at her helplessly. The deadly logic of her words there was no denying. A man must have been a stone who had failed to be touched by her earnestness.
“Teresa, if it were possible—anything that is possible I would promise at once. But I cannot face marrying just now.”
“But you won’t break it off!” Teresa cried eagerly. She had now the first advantage in the fight, and her eye lightened with hope. “Promise me that, and we will leave the rest... You can make an excuse and go abroad. There was no time fixed for our wedding, so no one will talk. And in a few months I could come out to you, and we could be married abroad, and travel until you heard of another post. I’ve always wanted to travel. You said you looked forward to showing me things.”
It was quite true. Dane as a world-traveller had found amusement in the country-bred girl’s primitive ideas of sightseeing, and had occupied occasional spare hours in sketching out programmes of imaginary tours. The remembrance came back to him with the remoteness of a childish dream, from which years had sapped the savour. Then he had been interested, amused; it had seemed a goodly task to act as Teresa’s guide; now the prospect filled him with dreary dread. He saw a mental picture of himself walking the sunlit streets, with a leaden heart, dragging through interminable lengths of galleries, sitting over tête-à-tête meals in crowded restaurants, obliged to talk, obliged to smile, and act the bridegroom’s part. With a wince of pain he saw himself and Teresa ensconced in a dream-like hotel on a dream-like Italian lake, watching happy lovers wander about a garden of almost unearthly beauty. Oh God, that beauty! How it would intensify every longing; how hopelessly, maddeningly wretched a man might be, alone, in Eden!
He did not speak, but his face spoke for him, and Teresa flushed and winced. She had humbled her pride to the dust, but it was impossible any longer to blind herself to the fact that for the time being her influence over Dane was dead. He had no feeling left but the kindly pity which was but another stab to her heart. Mind and heart alike were so filled by another image that there was no loophole by which she could enter in. For a bitter moment Teresa digested the fact, and faced the truth. She had done her utmost and she had failed, there remained to her but one hope—time! Given time and separation from the temptation her chance might return, but for the present she must stand aside. One more argument remained to her, and that she had hoped need not be made. She braced herself now to deliver it.
“For Lady Cassandra’s sake, it would be better if our engagement were not broken off now, when we are staying in the same house. People have noticed that you admire her. They might talk.”
He looked up quickly, and stretched out an impetuous hand.
“That’s good of you—to think of that! I wouldn’t for the whole world drag her name into it. They’ve no right to talk; I’ve given them no cause, but if there’s any fear... Thank you, Teresa!”
His hand gripped hers, but for the first time the girl’s fingers remained limp and irresponsive in his grasp. She was horribly sore, horribly wounded, her endurance was at an end, she wanted to get away to her own room, and hide her head and cry. She rose and faced him with a grave young dignity.