But he did not take it lightly. Rarely had his voice been more serious than when he answered: “I beg your pardon. I do not flirt—I have never flirted with Miss Carradyne.”
“No! It has looked like it.”
Mr. Grame remained silent. “I hope not,” he said at last. “I did not intend—I did not think. However, I must mend my manners,” he added more gaily. “To flirt at all would ill become my sacred calling. And Lucy Carradyne is superior to any such trifling.”
Her pulses were coursing on to fever heat. With her whole heart she loved Robert Grame: and the secret preference he had unconsciously betrayed for Lucy had served to turn her later days to bitterness.
“Possibly you mean something more serious,” said Eliza, compressing her lips.
“If I mean anything, I should certainly mean it seriously,” replied the young clergyman, his face blushing as he made the avowal. “But I may not. I have been reflecting much latterly, and I see I may not. If my income were good it might be a different matter. But it is not; and marriage for me must be out of the question.”
“With a portionless girl, yes. Robert Grame,” she went on rapidly with impassioned earnestness, “when you marry, it must be with someone who can help you; whose income will compensate for the deficiency of yours. Look around you well: there may be some young ladies rich in the world’s wealth, even in Church Leet, who will forget your want of fortune for your own sake.”
Did he misunderstand her? It was hardly possible. She had a large fortune; Lucy none. But he answered as though he comprehended not. It may be that he deemed it best to set her ill-regulated hopes at rest for ever.
“One can hardly suppose a temptation of that kind would fall in the way of an obscure individual like myself. If it did, I could only reject it. I should not marry for money. I shall never marry where I do not love.”
They had halted near one of the terrace seats. On it lay a toy of Kate’s, a little wooden “box of bells.” Mechanically, her mind far away, Eliza took it up and began, still mechanically, turning the wire which set the bells playing with a soft but not unpleasant jingle.