“Well, is that all you have to say? Emmy! yes, that’s my name; but you can’t crush me by saying ‘Emmy!’ to me,” she said, with a little breathless gasp, as of one who had seized the opportunity to work herself up into a fit of calculated impatience. She stopped here, perhaps moved by his pale face, and ended by a little laugh of ridicule. “Well, that’s natural enough, don’t you think?”
“I don’t know what is natural,” he said. “I have thrown off all that. Emmy, are you going to abandon me after all?”
“After all!—after what? I suppose you mean after all the great things you’ve done for me? What has it been, Mr. Penton? You’ve followed me here, you’ve watched me that I couldn’t take a step, or speak a word. No, I am not going with you any more. You must just make up your mind to it, Mr. Walter Penton. I’ve got other things in hand. I’ve other—I’ve—well, let us be vulgar,” she cried, with a wild little laugh, “I’ve got other fish to fry.”
The poor young fellow kept his eyes fixed upon her—eyes large with dismay and trouble.
“You are not going with me anymore! You can’t mean it!—you don’t mean it, Emmy!”
“But I do. It’s been all nonsense and romance and folly. I didn’t mind just for amusement. But do you think I am going to let you, with next to nothing, and expectations—expectations! what could your expectations be?—your father may live for a century! Do you think I’m going to let you stand in my way, and keep me from what’s better? No—and no again and again. I mean nothing of the sort. I mean what’s best for myself. I am not going with you any more.”
“Not going with me!” he said, in a voice of misery: “then what is to become of me?—what am I to do?”
“Oh, you’ll do a hundred things,” she said, tapping him on the arm; “go home, for one thing, and make your peace. It’s far better for you. It’s been folly for you as well as me. Go and take care of your ten thousand pounds. Ten thousand pounds! What do you think of as much as that a year? Take care of it, and you’ll get a nice little income out of it, just enough for a young man about town. And don’t be tyrannized over by your people, and don’t let any one say a word about marrying. You’re too young to be married. I’m your only real friend, Walter. Yes, I am. I tell you, don’t think of marrying—why should you marry?—but just have your fling and get a little fun while you can. That’s my last advice to you.”
He walked on with her mechanically, not able to speak, until she got impatient of the silent figure stalking by her side, struck dumb with youthful passion and misery.
She stopped suddenly and confronted him with hasty determination. “You’re not,” she said, “coming another step with me!”