Page:The Small House at Allington Vol 1.djvu/96

80 "I have always regarded you rather as a brother than as anything else."

"But that regard may be changed."

"No; I think not. Bernard, I will go further and speak on at once. It cannot be changed. I know myself well enough to say that with certainty. It cannot be changed."

"You mean that you cannot love me?"

"Not as you would have me do. I do love you very dearly,—very dearly, indeed. I would go to you in any trouble, exactly as I would go to a brother."

"And must that be all, Bell?"

"Is not that all the sweetest love that can be felt? But you must not think me ungrateful, or proud. I know well that you are—are proposing to do for me much more than I deserve. Any girl might be proud of such an offer. But, dear Bernard"

"Bell, before you give me a final answer, sleep upon this and talk it over with your mother. Of course you were unprepared, and I cannot expect that you should promise me so much without a moment's consideration."

"I was unprepared, and therefore I have not answered you as I should have done. But as it has gone so far, I cannot let you leave me in uncertainty. It is not necessary that I should keep you waiting. In this matter I do know my own mind. Dear Bernard, indeed, indeed it cannot be as you have proposed."

She spoke in a low voice, and in a tone that had in it something of almost imploring humility; but, nevertheless, it conveyed to her cousin an assurance that she was in earnest; an assurance also that that earnest would not readily be changed. Was she not a Dale? And when did a Dale change his mind? For a while he sat silent by her; and she too, having declared her intention, refrained from further words. For some minutes they thus remained, looking down into the ha-ha. She still kept her old position, holding her hands clasped together over her knees; but he was now lying on his side, supporting his head upon his arm, with his face indeed turned towards her, but with his eyes fixed upon the grass. During this time, however, he was not idle. His cousin's answer, though it had grieved him, had not come upon him as a blow stunning him for a moment, and rendering him unfit for instant thought. He was grieved, more grieved than he had thought he would have been. The thing that he had wanted moderately, he now wanted the more in that it was