Sara stood up with the intention of making him a stately and serious answer, but as she looked at his eager face, bent forward and gazing down at her, a sudden change came over her feelings. She had been laughing at him a moment before; now all at once, without any apparent provocation, she burst into tears. Sir Charles was very much dismayed. It did not occur to him to take advantage of her weeping, as Powys had done. He stared, and he drew a step farther back, and fell into a state of consternation. “I’ve said something I ought not to have said,” he exclaimed; “I know I’m a wretched fellow to talk; but then I thought you would understand.”
“I do understand,” cried Sara, in her impulsive way; “and papa was quite right, and I am a horrid wretch, and you are the best man in the world!”
“Not so much as that,” said Sir Charles, with a smile of satisfaction, which showed all his teeth under his black mustache; “but as long as you are pleased—Don’t cry. We’ll settle it all between us, and make him comfortable; and as for you and me—”
He made a step forward, beaming with content as he spoke, and poor Sara, drying her eyes hastily, and waking up to the urgency of the situation, retreated as he advanced.
“But, Sir Charles,” she cried, clasping her hands—“oh! what a wretch I am to take you in and vex you. Stop! I did not mean that. I meant—oh! I could kill myself—I think you are the best and kindest and truest man in the world, but it can never be me!”
Sir Charles stopped short. That air of flattered vanity and imbecile self-satisfaction with which most men receive the idea of being loved, suddenly yielded in his face to intense surprise. “Why? how? what? I don’t understand,” he stammered; and stood amazed, utterly at a loss to know what she could mean.
“It can never be me!” cried Sara. “I am not much good. I don’t deserve to be cared for. You will find somebody else a great deal nicer. There are girls in the house even—there is Fanny. Don’t be angry. I don’t think there is any thing particular in me.”
“But it is only you I fancy,” cried Sir Charles, deluded, poor man, by this humility, and once more lighting up with complaisance and self-satisfaction. “Fact is, we could be very comfortable together. I don’t know about any other girls. You’re nice enough for me.”
Then Sara sank once more into the chair where a few minutes before she had established herself with such state and dignity. “Don’t say any more,” she cried again, clasping her hands. “Don’t! I shall like you and be grateful to you all my life; but it can never be me!”
If Sara had been so foolish as to imagine that her unimpassioned suitor would be easily got rid of, she now found out her error. He stared at her, and he took a little walk around the table, and then he came back again. The facts of the case had not penetrated his mind. Her delicate intimations had no effect upon him. “If you like me,” he said, “that’s enough—fact is, I don’t see how any girl could be nicer. They say all girls talk like this at first. You and I might be very comfortable; and as for my mother—you know if you wanted to have the house to yourself—”