"I do believe you, and so will Adelaide after a time; take comfort, Hester."
"I cannot, with them all against me. Oh! who could ever dream our love for each other could melt away to this?"
"It is not, melted a way, dear sister, only obscured; it will one day return warmer and brighter than ever."
"Then you, you will write to me, you will not cast me off?"
"Never, never will I cast you off! never cease to love you!"
"Then, Eugene, you will help me also; I want to read, to know the cause of these unhappy divisions."
"And my father?"
"O Eugene! that is the misery my father must not know. Eugene, I love my father; there can be nothing wrong in that, he has only me now. We cannot help that; but I must be true to him, I cannot break his heart. He must not know we correspond or that I read your books, or that I am thinking on the subjects he hates so much. He need not know it; I am a woman now, I have a right to my [{758}] freedom. If I conceal my thought, it is out of love to him; you know well how it would pain him were he to suspect I read a work that treats on religion."
"Our correspondence must be secret; then?"
"I fear it must; at least till my father gets over this miserable prejudice. You can write and send to me under cover to Norah, my little maid. I will send her to you presently for some books, and now good-by, my father will be wanting me. Pray for us both, Eugene."