‘This much,’ said Rose—‘that I have promised to marry Mr Hammond, and would have been married to-morrow if you had not stopped me; therefore he is more to me than any one else.’
‘I am very thankful that I did stop you,’ I said. ‘How could you expect, Rose, to find any happiness in a union so hastily and wilfully contracted? How could you think of fleeing by night from the home where you have been sheltered since your childhood, where your every wish has been gratified, and ample provision made for your happiness, by one whose noble love you are incapable of appreciating? You have been strangely deluded to think of trusting your life to one who could propose so base a scheme.’
‘But what else could we do?’ said Rose, trying to defend her lover. ‘All things are fair in love and war. We knew that Mr Aslatt would never consent to our marriage. But if he heard that we were actually married, so that it was out of his power to separate us, he must then have forgiven us.’
‘So I have no doubt Mr Hammond thought,’ I remarked. ‘But Rose, do you positively think that Mr Aslatt would withhold his consent to your marriage if he were convinced that it would promote your happiness?’
‘No, not if he believed that,’ replied Rose. ‘But nothing would persuade him that Fritz Hammond could make me a good husband; he is dreadfully prejudiced against him. And he would never overlook Mr Hammond’s inferior position or forgive him for being poor, although he comes of a good family, and no one can say anything against him.’
‘It is strange,’ I remarked, ‘that being of good family he should be in his present position.’
‘There now; you are going to find fault with him!’ exclaimed Rose pettishly. ‘He is not to be blamed for his position, for great misfortunes have reduced him to it.’
‘How long is it since you promised to marry Mr Hammond?’ I inquired, after a pause.
‘A little while before you came here,’ was the reply. ‘At first we meant to tell Mr Aslatt all, and ask his consent; but he seemed so much opposed to Mr Hammond, that he—I mean we—feared to do so. We thought that if we settled the matter ourselves, it would cause Cousin less pain in the end.’
‘Less pain to find that you had been deceiving him, and putting more confidence in a comparative stranger, than in one who has befriended you all your life! It was by strange reasoning you arrived at such a conclusion, Rose!’