"It was no folly," she said.
"Oh, do you think I don't know that? The devil laughs in me, now and then, but I don't mean it. Oona—let me call you Oona, now, if never again—I had neither watched nor prayed——"
He made a pause, looking at her pitifully; and she, drawn, she knew not how, answered, with tears in her eyes, "I have heard that you—had strayed——"
"That means accidentally, innocently," he said. "It was not so. I had thought only of myself: when I was caught in the grip of a will stronger than mine, unprepared. There was set before me—no, not good and evil as in the books, but subjection to one—who cared neither for good nor evil. I was bidden to give up my own will, I who had cared for nothing else: to give up even such good as was in me. I was not cruel. I cared nothing about worldly advantages; but these were henceforward to be the rule of my life—pleasant, was it not?" he said with a laugh, "to a man who expected to be the master—of everything round."
At the sound of his laugh, which was harsh and wild, Hamish, raising himself so as to catch the eye of his mistress, gave her a questioning, anxious look. Oona was very pale, but she made an impatient gesture with her hand to her humble guardian. She was not herself at ease; an agonizing doubt lest Walter's mind should have given way had taken possession of her. She answered him as calmly as she could, but with a tremor in her voice, "Who could ask that, Lord Erradeen? Oh no, no—you have been deceived."
"You ask me who! you who gave me your hand—your hand that was like snow—that had never done but kindness all your life—and saved me—so that I defied him. And you ask me who?"
He put out his hand as he spoke and touched hers as it lay in her lap. His face was full of emotion, working and quivering. "Give it to me, Oona!—will you give it to me? I am not worthy that you should touch me. It has been said to me that you would turn from me—ah, with disgust!—if you knew. And I want you to know everything. For you gave it then without pausing to think. Oona! I am going to tell you everything. Give it to me," he said, holding out his hands one over the other to receive and clasp hers, his eyes moist, his lips appealing with a quivering smile of entreaty. And how may it be told what was in Oona's heart? Her whole being was moved through and through with tenderness, wonder, pity. Her hand seemed to move of itself towards him. The impulse was upon her almost too strong to be resisted, to throw her arms around him, like a mother with a child—to identify herself with him whatever might follow. The womanly instinct that held her back—that kept all these impulses in check and restrained the heart that seemed leaping out of her bosom towards this man whom she loved in spite of herself, and who had need of her, most sacred of all claims—was like a frame of iron round her, against which she struggled, but from which she could not get free. Tears filled her eyes—she clasped her hands together in an involuntary appeal. "What can I do? What can I do?" she cried.
"You shall hear all," said he. "I have tried everything before coming back to that which I always knew was my only hope. I fled away after that night. Do you remember?" (She almost smiled at this, for she remembered far better than he, and the wonder and despair of it, and his boat going away over the silent loch, and his face eager to be gone, and she indignant, astonished, feeling that her life went with him; but of all this he knew nothing.) "I fled—thinking I could escape and forget. There seemed no better way. There was no one to help me, only to mar and waste—what was all wasted and spoilt already. I want to tell you everything," he said faltering, drooping his head, withdrawing his eyes from her, "but I have not the courage—you would not understand me. Nothing that you could imagine could reach to a hundredth part of the evil I have known." He covered his face with his hands. The bitterness of the confession he dared not make seemed to stifle his voice and every hope.
And Oona's heart quivered and beat against the strong bondage that held it in, and her hands fluttered with longing to clasp him and console him. What woman can bear to hear out such a confession, not to interrupt it with pardon, with absolution, with cries to bring forth the fairest robe? She touched his head with her hands for a moment, a trembling touch upon his hair, and said, "God forgive you. God will forgive you," with a voice almost choked with tears.
He raised his head and looked at her with an eager cry. "I want—not forgiveness. I want life," he cried, "life, new life. I want to be born again. Is not that in the Bible? To be born again, to begin again from the beginning, everything new. Help me, Oona! I am not thinking of the past. It is now I am thinking of. I am not thinking of forgiveness—punishment if you please, anything!—but a new life. He knew man who said that," Walter cried, raising his head. "What use is it to me to forgive me? I want to be born again."