o violent that she had answered him only with tears
and protestations of undying anger. But her tears had been dried,
and her anger had passed away;--while the love remained. Ralph, her
Ralph, of course knew well enough that the tears were dry and the
anger gone. She could understand that he would understand that. But
the love which he had protested, if it were real love, would remain.
And why should she doubt him? The very fact that he was so dear to
her, made such doubts almost disgraceful. And yet there was so much
cause for doubt. Patience doubted. She knew herself that she feared
more than she hoped. She had resolved gallantly that she would be
true to her own heart, even though by such truth she should be
preparing for herself a life of disappointment. She had admitted
the passion, and she would stand by it. In all her fears, too, she
consoled herself by the reflection that her lover was hindered,
not by want of earnestness or want of truth,--but by the state
of his affairs. While he was still in debt, striving to save his
inheritance, but tormented by the growing certainty that it must
pass away from him, how could he give himself up to love-making and
preparations for marriage? Clary made excuses for him which no one
else would have made, and so managed to feed her hopes. "I made him
no answer," she said at last.

"And yet you knew you loved him."

"Yes; I knew that. I can tell you, and I told Patience. But I could
not tell him." She paused a moment thinking whether she could
describe the whole scene; but she found that she could not do that.
"I shall tell him, perhaps, when he comes again; that is, if he does
come."

"If he loves you he will come."

"I don't know. He has all these troubles on him, and he will be very
poor;--what will seem to him to be very poor. It would not be poor
for me, but for him it would."

"Would that hinder him?"

"How can I say? There are so many things a girl cannot know. He
may still be in debt, and then he has been brought up to want so
much. But it will make no more difference in me. And now you will
understand why I should tell you that I will never begrudge you your
good fortune. If all should come right, you shall give us a little
cottage near your grand house, and you will not despise us." Poor
Clary, when she spoke of her possible future lord, and the little
cottage on the Newton demesne, hardly understood the feelings with
which a disinherited heir must regard the p