“Oh, the desperate villain,” exclaimed her father, “to be guilty of such a thing! but you took the promise Una—you did—you did—I needn't ask.”
“No,” replied Una.
“No!” reechoed the father; “then you did not give the promise?”
“I mean,” she rejoined, “that you needn't ask.”
“Oh, faith, that alters the case extremely. Now, Una, this—all this promising that has passed between you and Connor O'Donovan is all folly. If you prove to be the good obedient girl that I hope you are, you'll put him out of your head, and then you can give back to one another whatever promises you made.”
This was succeeded by a silence of more than a minute. Una at length arose, and, with a composed energy of manner, that was evident by her sparkling eye and bloodless cheek, she approached her father, and calmly kneeling down, said slowly but firmly:
“Father, if nothing else can satisfy you, I will give back my promise; but then, father, it will break my heart, for I know—I feel—how I love him, and how I am loved by him.”
“I'll get you a better husband,” replied her father—“far more wealthy and more respectable than he is.”
“I'll give back the promise,” said she; “but the man is not living, except Connor O'Donovan, that will ever call me wife. More wealthy! more respectable!—Oh, it was only himself I loved. Father, I'm on my knees before you, and before my mother. I have only one request to make—Oh, don't break your daughter's heart!”
“God direct us,” exclaimed her mother; “it's hard to know how to act. If it would go so hard upon her, sure—”