"I do not know," I reply, in a half whisper of impatient misery, turning my head restlessly from side to side; "how should I know? I am sick of the subject."
"Perhaps!—so, God knows, am I; but had you any thing to say to it?"
He does not often touch me now; but, as he asks this, he takes hold of both my hands, more certainly to prevent my escaping from under his gaze, than from any desire to caress me.
It is my last chance of confession. I little thought I should ever have another. Late as it is, shall I avail myself of it? Nay! if not before, why now? Why now?—when there are so much stronger reasons for silence—when to speak would be to knock to atoms the newly-built edifice of Barbara's happiness—to rake up the old and nearly dead ashes of Frank's frustrated, and for aught I know, sincerely repented sin? So I answer, faintly indeed, yet quite audibly and distinctly:
"Nothing."
"Nothing?" (in an accent and with eyes of the keenest, wistfulest interrogation, as if he would wring from me, against my will, the confession I so resolutely withhold).
But I turn away from that heart-breaking, heart-broken scrutiny, and answer:
"Nothing!"