Sidwell smiled.

'Only to know me henceforth as the woman who did not dare to act upon
her best impulses.'

'As for "best"--I can't say. I don't glorify passion, as you know; and
on the other hand I have little sympathy with the people who are always
crying out for self-sacrifice. I don't know whether it would be "best"
to throw over your family, or to direct yourself solely with regard to
their comfort.'

Sidwell broke in.

'Yes, that is the true phrase--"their comfort". No higher word should
be used. That is the ideal of the life to which I have been brought up.
Comfort, respectability.--And has _he_ no right? If I sacrifice myself
to father and mother, do I not sacrifice _him_ as well? He has
forfeited all claim to consideration--that is what people say. With my
whole soul, I deny it! If he sinned against anyone, it was against me,
and the sin ended as soon as I understood him. That episode in his life
is blotted out; by what law must it condemn to imperfection the whole
of his life and of my own? Yet because people will not, cannot, look at
a thing in a spirit of justice, I must wrong myself and him.'

'Let us think of it more quietly,' said Sylvia, in her clear,
dispassionate tones. 'You speak as though a decision must be taken at
once. Where is the necessity for that? Mr. Peak is now independent.
Suppose a year or two be allowed to pass, may not things look
differently?'

'A year or two!' exclaimed Sidwell, with impatience. 'Nothing will be
changed. What I have to contend against is unchangeable. If I guide
myself by such a hope as that, the only reasonable thing would be for
me to write to Mr. Peak, and ask him to wait until my father and mother
are dead.'

'Very well. On that point we are at rest, then. The step must be taken
at once, or never.'

The wind roared, and for some minutes no other sound was audible. By
this [Updater's note: the word "time" missing?], all the inmates of the
house save the two friends were in bed, and most likely sleeping.

'You must think it strange,' said Sidwell, 'that I have chosen to tell
you all this, just when the confession is most humiliating to me. I
want to feel the humiliation, as one only can when another is witness
of it. I wish to leave myself no excuse for the future.'

'I'm not sure that I quite understand you. You have made up your mind
to break with him?'

'Because I am a coward.'

'If my feeling in any matter were as strong as that, I should allow i