“Yes: what a pity in that case that you were not married,” she said.
“I might be still,” cried Walter, with tremulous vehemence, “if you would have faith in me—if you would forget what I am, a nobody, and think what, with such a hope, I might be.”
“I!” there was a sound of mocking in the laughing voice; “what have I got to do with it? What would those great swells at Penton think if they knew you were saying such things to old Crockford’s niece.”
“It is they who have nothing to do with it,” he cried. “Do you think if you were to trust me that I should care what they—But oh, don’t, don’t call yourself so, you know it is not true; not that it matters if you were. You would to me, all the same, be always yourself, and that means everything that a woman can be.”
There was a pause before she replied, and her voice was a little softened. “They will never know anything about me at Penton, or anywhere else. I have come here in the dark; you have scarcely seen me in daylight at all, for all you are so silly.”
“Yes, a hundred times,” cried Walter. “Do you think you can go out that I don’t see you? I live about the roads since you have been here.”
“It is a pity,” she said, with a little sharpness, “that you have nothing better to do,” then, resuming her lighter tone, “If you don’t soon begin to do something a little more practical how are you ever to be—that somebody that you were offering to me?”
“It is true,” he said, “it is true; but don’t blame me. I am going to Oxford next month, and then, if I do not work—”
“To Oxford! But that’s not work, that’s only education,” she cried, with a faint mixture of something like disappointment in her voice.
“Education is work; it opens up everything. It gives a man a name. I have been kept back; but, oh, now, if you will say I may look forward—if you will say I may hope.”