You were quite
right. My dear, I have taken it into my head that you will be as ready
as ever to accept my advice, and will leave me (as your man of
business) to buy the annuity"--
She stopped him.
"No," she cried, "I won't hear a word more! Do you think I am
insensible to years of kindness that I have never deserved? Do you
think I forget how nobly you have forgiven me for those cruel refusals
which have saddened your life? Is it possible that you expect me to
borrow money of You?" She started wildly to her feet. "I declare, as
God hears me, I would rather die than take that base, that shameful
advantage of all your goodness to me. The woman never lived who owed so
much to a man, as I owe to you--but not money! Oh, my dear, not money!
not money!"
He was too deeply touched to be able to speak to her--and she saw it.
"What a wretch I am," she said to herself; "I have made his heart
ache!"
He heard those words. Still feeling for her--never, never for
himself!--he tried to soothe her. In the passion of her self-reproach,
she refused to hear him. Pacing the room from end to end, she fanned
the fiery emotion that was consuming her. Now, she reviled herself in
language that broke through the restraints by which good breeding sets
its seal on a woman's social rank.
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