“Was it because you felt bound by anything that's happened, and you wouldn't let me bear the laugh alone? I'm not afraid for myself. I shall never blame you. You can go perfectly free.”
“But I don't want to go free!”
Lydia looked at him with piercing earnestness. “Do you think I'm proud?” she asked.
“Yes, I think you are,” said Staniford, vaguely.
“It isn't for myself that I should be proud with other people. But I would rather die than bring ridicule upon one I—upon you.”
“I can believe that,” said Staniford, devoutly, and patiently reverencing the delay of her scruples.
“And if—and—” Her lips trembled, but she steadied her trembling voice. “If they laughed at you, and thought of me in a slighting way because—” Staniford gave a sort of roar of grief and pain to know how her heart must have been wrung before she could come to this. “You were all so good that you didn't let me think there was anything strange about it—”
“Oh, good heavens! We only did what it was our precious and sacred privilege to do! We were all of one mind about it from the first. But don't torture yourself about it, my darling. It's over now; it's past—no, it's present, and it will always be, forever, the dearest and best thing in life Lydia, do you believe that I love you?”
“Oh, I must!”
“And don't you believe that I'm telling you the truth when I say that I wouldn't, for all the world can give or take, change anything that's been?”