This is no child's play!'
A horrible dread had come over me that Eustace was in league with
them; for he always imperatively cut me short if I dared to say I was
already promised. I would hardly speak to him when at last he
brought me to his own rooms and shut the door; and when he called me
his poor Nan, I pushed him away, and said I wanted none of his pity,
I could not have thought it of him.
'You do not think it now,' he said; and as I looked up into his clear
eyes I was ashamed of myself, and could only murmur, what could I
think when I saw him sitting there aiding in their cruel manoeuvres,
--all for your own sake, too?
'I only sat there because I hoped to help you,' he said; and then he
bade me remember that they had disclosed nothing of these intentions
of theirs in the letters which spoke of an accommodation. If they
had done so, he might have left me in Holland with some of the
English ladies so as to be out of reach; but the scheme had only been
propounded to him on the previous morning. I asked why he had not
refused it at once, and he pointed out that it was not for him to
disclose my secret attachment, even had it been expedient so to do.
All that he had been able to do was to declare that the whole must
depend on my free consent. 'And,' he said, with a smile, 'methought
thereby I had done enough for our Nan, who has no weak will unless by
violence she over-strain it.'
I felt rebuked as well as reassured and strengthened, and he again
assured me that I was safe so long as he lived from being pressed
into any marriage contract displeasing to me.
Pages:
351
352
353
354
355
356
357
358
359
360
361
362
363
364
365
366
367
368
369
370
371
372
373
374
375