“For God’s sake, don’t say such things! I can’t bear them. Don’t you see how weak I am? Have mercy on me.”
“You don’t love me.”
“You know I love you,” she cried vehemently, angrily; “but because of my great love I beseech you to do your duty.”
“My duty is to be happy. Let us go where we can love one another—away from England, to some place where love isn’t sinful and ugly.”
“Oh, Basil,” she cried earnestly, stronger now because she had thrown herself on his charity; “oh, Basil, let us try to walk straight. Think of your wife, who loves you also—as much as I do. You’re all in the world to her; you can’t treat her so shamefully.”
She sank in a chair and dried her eyes. Her agony had calmed the man’s ardent passion, and it wrung his heart that she should weep.
“Don’t cry, Hilda; I can’t bear it.”
He was standing over her, and very gently she took his hand.
“Don’t you understand that we could never respect ourselves again if we did that poor creature such a fearful wrong? She would always be between us with her tears and her sorrows. I tell you I couldn’t bear it. Have mercy on me—if you love me at all.”
He did not answer, and very brokenly she went on.