‘Besides, Mr. Monson, we must consider Henrietta.’
‘It is natural you should think wholly of her,’ said I.
‘Not wholly. But this pursuit may end in rescuing her from Colonel Hope-Kennedy. It gives her future a chance. But you would have her husband sit quietly at home.’
‘Well, not exactly,’ I interrupted.
‘What would you have him do?’ she asked.
‘Get a divorce,’ said I.
‘He won’t do that,’ she exclaimed. ‘Marriage in his sight is a sacrament. Do not you know his views, Mr. Monson?’
‘You see, I have long lost sight of him.’
‘Well, I know he would not seek a divorce. He would be mad indeed,’ she cried, flushing to her brows, ‘to give my sister the liberty she wants and Colonel Hope-Kennedy——’ She faltered and stopped, biting her underlip, with the hot emotions which mounted to her face imparting a sudden air of womanly maturity to her girlish beauty, whilst her breast rose and fell to her ireful breathing. ‘This is no mad pursuit,’ she continued after a brief pause, speaking softly. ‘What is there unreasonable in a man’s determination to follow his wife that he may come as swiftly as the ship, the coach, the railway will permit him between her and a life of shame and remorse and misery?’
As she spoke, my cousin arrived, holding a great meerschaum pipe in his hand. She at once rose and left the table with a faint smile at me and a glance on top of it that was as eloquent as a whisper of regret at having been betrayed into warmth. Well, thought I, you are a sweet little woman, and it is highly probable that before I have been a week in your company I shall be head over heels in love with you. But for all that, you fair and artless creature, I don’t agree with you in your views of this chase. Suppose Wilfrid recaptures his wife—what is he going to do with her? She is not a lunatic; he cannot lock her up—but I broke off to the approach of my cousin, fetched my pipe, and went on deck with him.