Page:Rebecca.pdf/23

202 change many a habit, perhaps many a fault. I may have been rude, ay harsh, in my speech, but  my meaning has been kind. Save your youth from the rough chances of friendlessness and poverty: I offer you an honest name, competence, and an entire heart. We will both make allowances; there will be room in yonder arbour even for your lute; I will study my speech, and watch your look—till our hopes are together, and mutual affection has made our house thrice blessed." Rebecca felt that the tears were in her eyes, and that her voice was inarticulate; she paused a moment, from a reluctance to give Richard Vernon pain, and she left her hand in his as she spoke. "It may not be, my kind, my only friend: I must alter my very nature ere I could be happy as your wife. Vernon, I dare not marry you." He flung her hand from him as he caught her words; the long-subdued passion burst at last. "Accursed be the hour that ever the weakness of my nature led my soul into this folly! Go, and bear with you the bitterness you have infused into my cup; may you know poverty, guilt, sorrow, and shame—may you live to mourn, in sackcloth and ashes, the day you left this roof, never to re-enter it more!—Nay, forgive me!" but Rebecca had quitted the parlour. He made one step to follow her—the next moment he had thrown himself into the huge oaken settle, with his back to the light. The day after, he went to the old house—it was