Page:Tales of Three Cities (Boston, James R. Osgood & Co., 1884).djvu/116

104 He stared, leaning forward, with his hands on his knees. "Any test—any test—" he murmured.

"Don't give up Eunice, then; make another trial; I wish her to marry you!"

My words may have sounded like an atrocious joke, but they represented for me a great deal of hope and cheer. They brought a deep blush into Adrian Frank's face; he winced a little, as if he had been struck by a hand whose blow he could not return, and the tears suddenly started to his eyes. "Oh, Miss Condit!" he exclaimed.

What I saw before me was bright and definite; his distress seemed to me no obstacle, and I went on with a serenity of which I longed to make him perceive the underlying support. "Of course what I say seems to you like a deliberate insult; but nothing would induce me to give you pain if it were possible to spare you. But it is n't possible, my dear friend; it is n't possible. There is pain for you in the best thing I can say to you; there are situations in life in which we can only accept our pain. I can never marry you; I shall never marry any one. I am an old maid, and how can an old maid have a husband? I will be your friend, your sister, your brother, your mother, but I will never be your wife. I should like immensely to be your brother; for I don't like the brother you have got, and I think you deserve a better one. I believe, as I tell you, in everything you have said to me—in your affection, your tenderness, your honesty, the full consideration you have given