Page:The Small House at Allington Vol 1.djvu/169

Rh week past. For it was ruin,—utter ruin. He did love her; so he declared to himself. But was he a man who ought to throw the world away for love? Such men there were; but was he one of them? Could he be happy in that small house, somewhere near the New Road, with five children and horrid misgivings as to the baker's bill? Of all men living, was not he the last that should have allowed himself to fall into such a trap? All this passed through his mind as he turned his face up to the clouds with a look that was intended to be grand and noble.

"Speak to me, Adolphus, and say that it shall be so."

Then his heart misgave him, and he lacked the courage to extricate himself from his trouble; or, as he afterwards said to himself, he had not the heart to do it. "If I understand you, rightly, Lily, all this comes from no want of love on your own part?"

"Want of love on my part? But you should not ask me that."

"Until you tell me that there is such a want, I will agree to no parting." Then he took her hand and put it within his arm. "No, Lily; whatever may be our cares and troubles, we are bound together,—indissolubly."

"Are we?" said she; and as she spoke, her voice trembled, and her hand shook.

"Much too firmly for any such divorce as that. No, Lily, I claim the right to tell you all my troubles; but I shall not let you go."

"But, Adolphus—" and the hand on his arm was beginning to cling to it again.

"Adolphus," said he, "has got nothing more to say on that subject. He exercises the right which he believes to be his own, and chooses to retain the prize which he has won."

She was now clinging to him in very truth. "Oh, my love!" she said. "I do not know how to say it again. It is of you that I am thinking;—of you, of you!"

"I know you are; but you have misunderstood me a little; that's all."

"Have I? Then listen to me again, once more, my heart's own darling, my love, my husband, my lord! If I cannot be to you at once like Ruth, and never cease from coming after you, my thoughts to you shall be like those of Ruth:—if aught but death part thee and me, may God do so to me and more also." Then she fell upon his breast and wept.