Cicely grew indignant again. “How little you understand!” she exclaimed. “Supposing I were different from what I am—supposing I could still have cared for you in the old way—what would that have mattered? I would not have married you; do you think I would or could have married a man who came to me with another woman’s broken heart in his hand?”
Mr. Fawcett laughed. “It is hardly a case of a broken heart,” he said sneeringly.
“How can you tell? Oh! Trevor, don’t make me lose respect for you altogether!” exclaimed Cicely passionately. “I know Geneviève better than you do; I know her faults and weaknesses. But I will not let you speak against her. She loves you, she is all but broken hearted already. I tremble to think what she might have been driven to. You don’t know what she has suffered these last days; you have not seen her lately.”
“Yes I have,” he replied. “I saw her yesterday morning.”
And unconsciously his tone softened as he recalled the blank misery of the pretty face, the anguish in the brown eyes, when, as gently as he knew how, he had broken to her the inevitable change in his intentions, the necessity under which he was placed by her cousin’s altered circumstances of fulfilling his engagement.
“Yesterday morning,” repeated Cicely. “You met her I suppose. Yes, I understand now what made her look as she did when she came in.”
“She has never understood you. She sincerely believed you did not care for me. There is that to be said for her, at least,” said Trevor.
“And she is so young, so ignorant,” added Cicely generously. “And she loves you, Trevor. There is this one thing for you to do, to retain, to increase my sisterly regard for you. You must be very good to her always.”
But Trevor only groaned.
“Will you promise me this, Trevor?” said Cicely.