"I am excessively happy because you believe I am happy. Many people don't: many people think I am disappointed. My own mother thinks so, and yet she is a good woman. People will believe that you wish the death of your dearest friend if he stands between you and material good. It is horrible, and I have been courted and worshiped as the rising sun;" and he laughed. "One can afford to laugh at it now, but it was very sickening at the time. I can afford anything, Alice: I believe I can even afford to marry, if you'll marry a hard-working man instead of a duke."
"Oh, George," she said, "I have been so ashamed of that letter I wrote."
"It was a wicked little letter," he said, "but I suppose it was the truth at the time: say it is not true now."
"It is not true now," she repeated, "but I have not loved you very dearly all the time; and if you had married I should have been very happy if you had been happy. But oh," she said, and her eyes filled with tears, "this is far better."
"You love me now?"
"Unutterably."
"I have loved you all the time, all the time. I should not have been happy if I had heard of your marriage."
"Then how were you so cold and distant the day we stuck on the moor?"
"Because it was excessively cold weather: I was not going to warm myself up to be frozen again. I have never been in delicate health, but I can't stand heats and chills."