Chapter 18

sincerely--warmly. God knows I have suffered myself enough from idle words, and from the slighting opinion with which this hard world visits the poor, not to feel deep regret and shame if I wound, by like means, another, more especially”--Constance’s voice trembled,--“more especially _you!_”

As she spoke, she turned her eyes on Godolphin, and they were full of tears. The tenderness of her voice, her look, melted him at once. Was it to him, indeed, that the haughty Constance addressed the words of kindness and apology?--to him whose intrinsic circumstances she had heard described as so unworthy of her, and, his reason told him, with such justice?

“Oh, Miss Vernon!” said he, passionately; “Miss Vernon--Constance--dear, dear Constance! dare I call you so? hear me one word. I love you with a love which leaves me no words to tell it. I know my faults, my poverty, my unworthiness; but--but--may I--may I hope?”

And all the woman was in Constance’s cheek, as she listened. That cheek, how richly was it dyed! Her eyes drooped; her bosom heaved. How every word in those broken sentences sank into her heart! never was a tone forgotten. The child may forget its mother, and the mother desert the child: but never, never from a woman’s heart departs the memory of the first confession of love from him whom she first loves! She lifted her eyes, and again withdrew them, and again gazed.

“This must not be,” at last she said; “no, no! it is folly, madness in both!”

“Not so; nay, not so!” whispered Godolphin, in the softest notes of a voice that could never be harsh. “It may seem folly--madness if you will, that the brilliant and all-idolized Miss Vernon should listen to the vows of so lowly an adorer: but try me--prove me, and own--yes, you _will_ own some years hence, that that folly has been happy beyond the happiness of prudence or ambition.”

“This!” answered Constance, struggling with her emotions; “this is no spot or hour for such a conference. Let us meet to-morrow--the western chamber.”

“And the hour?”

“Twelve!”

“And I may hope--till then?”

Constance again grew pale; and in a voice that, though it scarcely left her lips, struck coldness and dismay into his sudden and delighted confidence, answered,

“No, Percy, there is no hope!--none!”

(1) Then uncommon.