too, for nothing? I was
fool enough when I came here from Nice, after papa's death to let you
talk nonsense to me for a month or two."

"Did you or did you not swear that you loved me?"

"Oh, Mr. Clavering, I did not imagine that your strength would have
condescended to take such advantage over the weakness of a woman. I
remember no oaths of any kind, and what foolish assertions I may have
made, I am not going to repeat. It must have become manifest to you
during these two years that all that was a romance. If it be a pleasure
to you to look back to it, of that pleasure I cannot deprive you.
Perhaps I also may sometimes look back. But I shall never speak of that
time again; and you, if you are as noble as I take you to be, will not
speak of it either. I know you would not wish to injure me."

"I would wish to save you from the misery you are bringing on yourself."

"In that you must allow me to look after myself. Lord Ongar certainly
wants a wife, and I intend to be true to him, and useful."

"How about love?"

"And to love him, sir. Do you think that no man can win a woman's love,
unless he is filled to the brim with poetry, and has a neck like Lord
Byron, and is handsome like your worship? You are very handsome, Harry,
and you, too, should go into the market and make the best of yourself.
Why should you not learn to love some nice girl that has money to assist
you?"

"Julia."

"No, sir; I will not be called Julia. If you do, I will be insulted, and
leave you instantly. I may call you Harry, as being so much
younger--though we were born in the same month--and as a sort of cousin.
But I shall never do that after to-day."

"You have courage enough, then, to tell me that you have not ill-used
me?"

"Certainly I have. Why, what a fool you would have me be! Look at me,
and tell me whether I am fit to be the wife of such a one as you. By the
time you are entering the world, I shall be an old woman, and shall have
lived my life. Even if I were fit to be your mate when we were living
here together, am I fit, after what I have done and seen during the last
two years? Do you think it would really do any good to any one if I were
to jilt, as you call it, Lord Ongar, and tell them all--your cousin, Sir
Hugh, and my sister, and your father--that I was going to keep myself
up, and marry you when you were ready for me?"

"You mean to say that the evil is done."

"No, indeed. At the present moment I owe six hundred pou