"
"It is well that he hears you not," answered Menie Gray, resenting, with
natural feeling, the imputation on her lover. Then instantly softening
her tone she added, "My voice ought not to aggravate, but to soothe your
quarrel. Mr. Hartley, I plight my word to you that you do Richard
wrong."
She said these words with affected calmness, suppressing all appearance
of that displeasure, of which she was evidently sensible, upon this
depreciation of a beloved object.
Hartley compelled himself to answer in the same strain.
"Miss Gray," he said, "your actions and motives will always be those of
an angel; but let me entreat you to view this most important matter with
the eyes of worldly wisdom and prudence. Have you well weighed the risks
attending the course which you are taking in favour of a man, who,--nay,
I will not again offend you--who may, I hope, deserve your favour?"
"When I wished to see you in this manner, Mr. Hartley, and declined a
communication in public, where we could have had less freedom of
conversation, it was with the view of telling you every thing. Some pain
I thought old recollections might give, but I trusted it would be
momentary; and, as I desire to retain your friendship, it is proper I
should show that I still deserve it. I must then first tell you my
situation after my father's death. In the world's opinion we were always
poor, you know; but in the proper sense I had not known what real
poverty was, until I was placed in dependence upon a distant relation of
my poor father, who made our relationship a reason for casting upon me
all the drudgery of her household, while she would not allow that it
gave me a claim to countenance, kindness, or anything but the relief of
my most pressing wants.
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