‘Not more than you vex and disturb me. But you cannot hate the man who loves you so devotedly?’
‘I have said before I don’t hate you. I repeat that I am interested in your family and its associations because of its complete contrast with my own.’ She might have added, ‘And I am additionally interested just now because my uncle has forbidden me to be.’
‘But you don’t care enough for me personally to save my happiness.’
Paula hesitated; from the moment De Stancy confronted her she had felt that this nocturnal conversation was to be a grave business. The cathedral clock struck three. ‘I have thought once or twice,’ she said with a naivete unusual in her, ‘that if I could be sure of giving peace and joy to your mind by becoming your wife, I ought to endeavour to do so and make the best of it—merely as a charity. But I believe that feeling is a mistake: your discontent is constitutional, and would go on just the same whether I accepted you or no. My refusal of you is purely an imaginary grievance.’
‘Not if I think otherwise.’
‘O no,’ she murmured, with a sense that the place was very lonely and silent. ‘If you think it otherwise, I suppose it is otherwise.’
‘My darling; my Paula!’ he said, seizing her hand. ‘Do promise me something. You must indeed!’
‘Captain De Stancy!’ she said, trembling and turning away. ‘Captain De Stancy!’ She tried to withdraw her fingers, then faced him, exclaiming in a firm voice a third time, ‘Captain De Stancy! let go my hand; for I tell you I will not marry you!’
‘Good God!’ he cried, dropping her hand. ‘What have I driven you to say in your anger! Retract it—O, retract it!’
‘Don’t urge me further, as you value my good opinion!’