"Mr. Bruff! I have believed in that man. I have promised to marry that
man. How can I tell him he is mean, how can I tell him he has deceived
me, how can I disgrace him in the eyes of the world after that? I have
degraded myself by ever thinking of him as my husband. If I say what you
tell me to say to him--I am owning that I have degraded myself to his
face. I can't do that. After what has passed between us, I can't do
that! The shame of it would be nothing to HIM. But the shame of it would
be unendurable to _me_."

Here was another of the marked peculiarities in her character disclosing
itself to me without reserve. Here was her sensitive horror of the bare
contact with anything mean, blinding her to every consideration of what
she owed to herself, hurrying her into a false position which might
compromise her in the estimation of all her friends! Up to this time,
I had been a little diffident about the propriety of the advice I had
given to her. But, after what she had just said, I had no sort of doubt
that it was the best advice that could have been offered; and I felt no
sort of hesitation in pressing it on her again.

She only shook her head, and repeated her objection in other words.

"He has been intimate enough with me to ask me to be his wife. He has
stood high enough in my estimation to obtain my consent. I can't tell
him to his face that he is the most contemptible of living creatures,
after that!"

"But, my dear Miss Rachel," I remonstrated, "it's equally impossible for
you to tell him that you withdraw from your engagement without giving
some reason for it."

"I shall say that I have thought it over, and that I am satisfied it
will be best for both of us if we part.

"No more than that?"

"No more."

"Have you thought of what he may say, on his side?"

"He may say what he pleases."

It was impossible not to admire her delicacy and her resolution, and it
was equally impossible not to feel that she was putting herself in the
wrong. I entreated her to consider her own position I reminded her that
she would be exposing herself to the most odious misconstruction of her
motives. "You can't brave public opinion," I said, "at the command of
private feeling."

"I can," she answered. "I have done it already."

"What do you mean?"

"You have forgotten the Moonstone, Mr. Bruff. Have I not braved public
opinion, THERE, with my own private reasons for it?"

Her answer silenced me for the moment. It set