attered my
life is. As for this marriage, the whole thing is repugnant to me;
personally, I had rather sacrifice fifty properties than go through
it, but I know that I ought to think of others. Mr. Fraser tells me
that it is my duty to consult you, that you will naturally have my
interest most at heart, that it was into your hands and to your care
that my mother consigned me on her deathbed. Father"--and she clasped
her hands and looked him full in the face with her earnest eyes--"Mr.
Fraser is right, it must be for you to decide. I will trust you
entirely, and leave the burden of decision to your honour and
generosity; only I say, spare me if you can."

Philip rose and went to look out of the window, that he might hide the
evident agitation of his face and the tremor of his limbs. He felt
that the crucial moment had come. All his poor sophistry, all his
miserable shuffling and attempts to fix the responsibility of his acts
on others, had recoiled upon his own head. She had come to him and
laid the burden on his heart. What should he answer? For a moment the
shades--for with him they were only shades--of good angels gained the
upper hand, and he was about to turn and look her in the face--for
then he felt he could have looked her in the face--and bid her have
nothing to do with George and his proposals. But, even in the act of
turning to obey the impulse, his eyes fell upon the roof of Isleworth
Hall, which, standing on an eminence, could easily be seen from the
Abbey House, and his mind, quicker than the eye, flew to the outlook
place upon that roof where he had so often climbed as a boy, and
surveyed the fair champaign country beyond it; meadow and wood, fallow
and cornland, all of which were for him involved in that answer. He
did not stop turning, but--so quick is the working of the mind--he
changed the nature of his answer. The real presence of the demon of
greed chased away the poor angelic shadows.

"It would not be much of a sacrifice for you, Angela, to go through
this form; he is a dying man, and you need not even change your name.
The lands are mine by right, and will be yours. It will break my heart
to lose them, after all these years of toiling to save enough to buy
them. But I do not wish to force you. In short, I leave the matter to
your generosity, as you would have left it to mine."

"And suppose that I were to marry my cousin George, and he were not to
die after all, what would be my position then?