‘No,’ she cried, hurriedly. ‘No; I am always a fool, and never know what I am doing. No. Dinna say a word now.’
Then he stopped suddenly, the very words arrested on his lips, and gazed at her wondering, not knowing what she could mean.
‘You don’t understand me either,’ cried Isabel. ‘Oh, not a word—not a word! You cannot judge him right; you never saw him like me. He was bewildered with the news; he never meant that.’
‘If I were to say the like, would you ever forgive me?’ said the minister, shaking his head. She answered only by weeping, a mode of reply which took all power of remonstrance or protestation away from the spectator. A hundred contradictory emotions were in Isabel’s tears. Shame and pain over the letter; shame still sharper, if not so deep, that she had offered it to the criticism of another; wrath against Stapylton; rage at herself; and a certain bitterness against her companion for not taking her lover’s part to her, for not contradicting her, and pleading his rival’s cause. She could not have spoken all this wild jumble of pain and passion; but she poured it all forth in tears.
It was the postscript which had specially excited her, and which ran as follows:—
‘I have just heard that my father is ill, and I must go. I would have waited till to-morrow even now, but I hear he might alter his will, which would never do. It is all your own fault. I was ready, waiting for you—as you know. What could a man do more? If you will come, and meet me somewhere on the Border, as soon as this business is settled, you will find me as ready then as I was to-day. No time to say a word more.’
Mr. Lothian once more left her side, and went back to the window in his perplexity.
‘I should not disturb you,’ he said, with his back to her. ‘I should go away. But it is grievous to me to see your tears. I would give my very blood to save one tear falling from your eyes. And he would wring tears of blood out of your heart; and yet he is chosen, and I am rejected. What more can I have to say?’
‘Nothing! oh, nothing!’ cried Isabel. ‘Oh, will you not understand? I would like to hide myself in the depths of the earth. I was going to him yesterday, when I fainted. I have kept it a secret, and it was like a lie burning in my heart. Now I have told you; I would have gone with him if I had kept in life. What better am I than him? He is free to speak, for he sees I am no better. It is my fault, and not his. And now you know,’ cried the girl, clasping her passionate hands together, ‘and you may despise me! I let him tempt me; I could not bear the awfu’ quiet. I’ll cure you at least, if I shame myself. It was me that was to blame.’
‘But I am not cured. I’ll never be cured, my dear, my dear!’ cried the grey-haired man, coming back to her, with tears in his eyes, and taking her hands into his own. ‘It was your innocence, and your grief. Do you think I do not know of the struggle that was in your heart?’