The Duke's Children Part 110

"Did you speak of your love! And now, Silverbridge,--for if there be an English gentleman on earth I think that you are one,--as a gentleman tell me this. Did you not even tell your father that I should be your wife? I know you did."

"Did he tell you?"

"Men such as you and he, who cannot even lie with your eyelids, who will not condescend to cover up a secret by a moment of feigned inanimation, have many voices. He did tell me; but he broke no confidence. He told me, but did not mean to tell me. Now you also have told me."

"I did. I told him so. And then I changed my mind."

"I know you changed your mind. Men often do. A pinker pink, a whiter white,--a finger that will press you just half an ounce the closer,--a cheek that will consent to let itself come just a little nearer--!"

"No; no; no!" It was because Isabel had not easily consented to such approaches!

"Trifles such as these will do it;--and some such trifles have done it with you. It would be beneath me to make comparisons where I might seem to be the gainer. I grant her beauty. She is very lovely. She has succeeded."

"I have succeeded."

"But--I am justified, and you are condemned. Is it not so? Tell me like a man."

"You are justified."

"And you are condemned? When you told me that I should be your wife, and then told your father the same story, was I to think it all meant nothing! Have you deceived me?"

"I did not mean it."

"Have you deceived me? What; you cannot deny it, and yet have not the manliness to own it to a poor woman who can only save herself from humiliation by extorting the truth from you!"

"Oh, Mabel, I am so sorry it should be so."

"I believe you are,--with a sorrow that will last till she is again sitting close to you. Nor, Silverbridge, do I wish it to be longer.

No;--no;--no. Your fault after all has not been great. You deceived, but did not mean to deceive me?"

"Never; never."

"And I fancy you have never known how much you bore about with you. Your modesty has been so perfect that you have not thought of yourself as more than other men. You have forgotten that you have had in your hand the disposal to some one woman of a throne in Paradise."

"I don't suppose you thought of that."

"But I did. Why should I tell falsehoods now? I have determined that you should know everything,--but I could better confess to you my own sins when I had shown that you too have not been innocent. Not think of it! Do not men think of high t.i.tles and great wealth and power and place? And if men, why should not women? Do not men try to get them;--and are they not even applauded for their energy? A woman has but one way to try. I tried."

"I do not think it was all for that."

"How shall I answer that without a confession which even I am not hardened enough to make? In truth, Silverbridge, I have never loved you."

He drew himself up slowly before he answered her, and gradually a.s.sumed a look very different from that easy boyish smile which was customary to him. "I am glad of that," he said.

"Why are you glad?"

"Now I can have no regrets."

"You need have none. It was necessary to me that I should have my little triumph;--that I should show you that I knew how far you had wronged me! But now I wish that you should know everything. I have never loved you."

"There is an end of it then."

"But I have liked you so well,--so much better than all others! A dozen men have asked me to marry them. And though they might be nothing till they made that request, then they became--things of horror to me. But you were not a thing of horror. I could have become your wife, and I think that I could have learned to love you."

"It is best as it is."

"I ought to say so too; but I have a doubt I should have liked to be d.u.c.h.ess of Omnium, and perhaps I might have fitted the place better than one who can as yet know but little of its duties or its privileges. I may, perhaps, think that that other arrangement would have been better even for you."

"I can take care of myself in that."

"I should have married you without loving you, but I should have done so determined to serve you with a devotion which a woman who does love hardly thinks necessary. I would have so done my duty that you should never have guessed that my heart had been in the keeping of another man."

"Another man!"

"Yes; of course. If there had been no other man, why not you? Am I so hard, do you think that I can love no one? Are you not such a one that a girl would naturally love,--were she not preoccupied? That a woman should love seems as necessary as that a man should not."

"A man can love too."

"No;--hardly. He can admire, and he can like, and he can fondle and be fond. He can admire, and approve, and perhaps worship. He can know of a woman that she is part of himself, the most sacred part, and therefore will protect her from the very winds. But all that will not make love. It does not come to a man that to be separated from a woman is to be dislocated from his very self. A man has but one centre, and that is himself. A woman has two. Though the second may never be seen by her, may live in the arms of another, may do all for that other that man can do for woman,--still, still, though he be half the globe asunder from her, still he is to her the half of her existence. If she really love, there is, I fancy, no end of it. To the end of time I shall love Frank Tregear."

"Tregear!"

"Who else?"

"He is engaged to Mary."

"Of course he is. Why not;--to her or whomsoever else he might like best? He is as true I doubt not to your sister as you are to your American beauty,--or as you would have been to me had fancy held. He used to love me."

"You were always friends."

"Always;--dear friends. And he would have loved me if a man were capable of loving. But he could sever himself from me easily, just when he was told to do so. I thought that I could do the same. But I cannot. A jackal is born a jackal, and not a lion, and cannot help himself. So is a woman born--a woman. They are clinging, parasite things, which cannot but adhere; though they destroy themselves by adhering. Do not suppose that I take a pride in it. I would give one of my eyes to be able to disregard him."

"Time will do it."

"Yes; time,--that brings wrinkles and rouge-pots and rheumatism.

Though I have so hated those men as to be unable to endure them, still I want some man's house, and his name,--some man's bread and wine,--some man's jewels and t.i.tles and woods and parks and gardens,--if I can get them. Time can help a man in his sorrow. If he begins at forty to make speeches, or to win races, or to breed oxen, he can yet live a prosperous life. Time is but a poor consoler for a young woman who has to be married."

"Oh, Mabel."

"And now let there be not a word more about it. I know--that I can trust you."

"Indeed you may."

"Though you will tell her everything else you will not tell her this."

"No;--not this."

"And surely you will not tell your sister!"