"Why, yes!" he said, confidently, for he saw that she was yielding (and his own susceptibilities were not likely to be wounded in that direction). "Think you we should heed any tavern scurrility? I trow not! There would be the answer plain and clear—if you were my wife, Judith."
"They would be pleased," again she said, and her eyes were absent. And then she added, "I pray you pardon me, good sir, if I speak of that which you may deem out of place, but—but if you knew—how I have been striving to think of some means of repairing the wrong I have done my father, you would not wonder that I should be anxious, and perchance indiscreet. You know of the loss I have caused him and his companions. How could I ever make that good with the work of my own hands? That is not possible; and yet when I think of how he hath toiled for all of us—late and early, as it were—why, good sir, I have myself been bold enough to chide him—or to wish that I were a man, to ride forth in the morning in his stead and look after the land; and then that his own daughter should be the means of taking from him what he hath earned so hardly—that I should never forget; 'twould be on my mind year after year, even if he were himself to try to forget it."
She paused for a second; the mere effort of speaking seemed to fatigue her.
"There is but the one means, as I can think, of showing him my humble sorrow for what hath been done—of making him some restitution. I know not what my marriage-portion may be—but 'twill be something—and Susan saith there is a part of the manor of Rowington, also, that would fall to me; now, see you, good Master Blaise, if I were to give these over to my father in part quittance of this injury—or if, belike—my—my—husband would do that—out of generosity and nobleness—would not my father be less aggrieved?"
She had spoken rather quickly and breathlessly (to get over her embarrassment), and now she regarded him with a strange anxiety, for so much depended on his answer! Would he understand her motives? Would he pardon her bluntness? Would he join her in this scheme of restitution?
He hesitated only for a moment.
"Dear Judith," he said, with perfect equanimity, "such matters are solely within the province of men, and not at the disposition of women, who know less of the affairs of the world. Whatever arrangements your father may have made in respect of your marriage-portion—truly I have made no inquiry in that direction—he will have made with due regard to his own circumstances, and with regard to the family and to your future. Would he be willing to upset these in order to please a girlish fancy? Why, in all positions in life pecuniary losses must happen; and a man takes account of these; and is he likely to recover himself at the expense of his own daughter?"
"Nay, but if she be willing! If she would give all that she hath, good sir!" she cried, quickly.
"'Twould be but taking it from one pocket to put it in the other," said he, in his patient and forbearing way. "I say not, if a man were like to become bankrupt, that his family might not forego their expectations in order to save him; but your father is one in good position. Think you that the loss is so great to him? In truth it cannot be."
The eagerness fell away from her face. She saw too clearly that he could not understand her at all. She did not reckon her father's loss in proportion to his wealth—in truth, she could not form the faintest notion of what that loss might be; all her thought was of her winning back (in some remote day, if that were still possible to her) to her father's forgiveness, and the regarding of his face as no longer in dread wrath against her.