He looked up at her as he sat: "Aunt Harriet, I meant it for the best. Say what you like: I was a brute, I suppose, but I thought I was doing right."
"What do you mean?" Her tone was gentler: she detected the misery in his.
Percival took her hand and laid it on his forehead. "You can't think I meant to be cruel to our Sissy," he said. "You will let me speak to her?"
She softly pushed back his hair. After all, he was the man Sissy loved. "What was it?" she asked: "what did you do?"
He looked down. "I'm going to marry Miss Lisle," he said.
She started away from him: "You told her that? God forgive you, Percival!"
"I should have been a liar if I hadn't."
"Couldn't you let her die in peace? It is such a little while! Couldn't you have waited till she was in her grave?"
"Will she see me? Just one word, Aunt Harriet." And yet while he pleaded he did not know what the one word was that he would say. Only he felt that he must see her once more.
"Not now," said Mrs. Middleton. "My poor darling shall not be tortured any more. Later, if she wishes it, but not now. She could not bear it."