“You don’t! You cannot! Who told you about him? And what did they tell you? Oh, this is awful, it is worse than I feared,” she exclaimed, in great distress. “And now it is all too late.”
“Too late for what? To do what?”
“To help me. To save me from him.”
“Does this man want to marry you?”
“He is going to. He must marry me. Ah! You don’t know—you—”
My love shuddered, without completing her sentence.
“Why? Is it to save your father?” I hazarded again.
“To save my father—and my mother,” she exclaimed. And then, to my surprise, she sank upon a chair, flung her arms out upon the table in front of her, hid her face up on them, and began to sob hysterically.
“Vera, my dearest, don’t—oh! don’t,” I said beseechingly, as I bent down, put an arm tenderly about her, and kissed her upon the cheek. “Don’t cry like that, darling. It’s never too late, until a misfortune has really happened. You are not married to him. There may be a way of escape. Trust me. Treat me as a friend—we have been friends so long—tell me everything, and I will try to help you out of all your trouble.”
She started up.