still. If
you refuse me now I shall go away,--and live wildly."

"Oswald, what do you mean?"

"I mean that I will go to some distant part of the world, where I
may be killed or live a life of adventure. But I shall do so simply
in despair. It will not be that I do not know how much better and
greater should be the life at home of a man in my position."

"Then do not talk of going."

"I cannot stay. You will acknowledge, Violet, that I have never lied
to you. I am thinking of you day and night. The more indifferent you
show yourself to me, the more I love you. Violet, try to love me." He
came up to her, and took her by both her hands, and tears were in his
eyes. "Say you will try to love me."

"It is not that," said Violet, looking away, but still leaving her
hands with him.

"It is not what, dear?"

"What you call,--trying."

"It is that you do not wish to try?"

"Oswald, you are so violent, so headstrong. I am afraid of you,--as
is everybody. Why have you not written to your father, as we have
asked you?"

"I will write to him instantly, now, before I leave the room, and
you shall dictate the letter to him. By heavens, you shall!" He had
dropped her hands when she called him violent; but now he took them
again, and still she permitted it. "I have postponed it only till I
had spoken to you once again."

"No, Lord Chiltern, I will not dictate to you."

"But will you love me?" She paused and looked down, having even now
not withdrawn her hands from him. But I do not think he knew how much
he had gained. "You used to love me,--a little," he said.

"Indeed,--indeed, I did."

"And now? Is it all changed now?"

"No," she said, retreating from him.

"How is it, then? Violet, speak to me honestly. Will you be my wife?"
She did not answer him, and he stood for a moment looking at her.
Then he rushed at her, and, seizing her in his arms, kissed her all
over,--her forehead, her lips, her cheeks, then both her hands, and
then her lips again. "By G----, she is my own!" he said. Then he went
back to the rug before the fire, and stood there with his back turned
to her. Violet, when she found herself thus deserted, retreated to
a sofa, and sat herself down. She had no negative to produce now in
answer to the violent assertion which he had pronounced as to his
own success. It was true. She had doubted, and doubted,--and still
doubted. But now she must doubt no longer. Of one thing she was quite
sure. She could lov