I was struck with dismay.
"Please do not say that!" I said trembling. "My thoughts
should rule only my own life; not anybody, else's."
"One more!" said Hugh Marshall. "They must rule one more.
There will be one, somewhere, whose highest pleasure will be
to please you, as long as he has a life to give to it. - Will
you take mine?" he said after a pause and in a lower tone. "I
offer it to you undividedly."
It cannot be told, the sickness of heart which came over me.
The mistake I had made in my blindness, the sorrowfulness of
it, the pain I must give, the mischief it might do, I saw it
all at once. For a while, I could not find words to speak.
Hugh studied my face, and must have seen no ground of hope
there, for he did not speak either. He was quite silent and
left it to me. Oh, Lake of Annecy! what pain comes to me now
with the remembrance of your sweet waters.
I turned at last and laid my hand upon Hugh's arm. He did not
mistake me; he took my hand in his, and stood looking at me
with a face as grave as my own.
"What is the matter, Daisy?" he said sorrowfully.
"I have made a miserable mistake!" I said. "Cannot we be
friends, Mr. Marshall? - dear friends, and nothing more?"
"Why 'nothing more'?"
"I can be no more to you," I answered.
"Why not?"
"I have not the feeling. I have not the power. I would, if I
could."
"It is I who have made a mistake," he said, as he dropped my
hand.
"No, it is I," I said bitterly. "I have been childishly wrong.
I have been foolish. It never entered my thought, that you -
or anybody - liked me, except as a friend."
"And he got your heart without your knowing it?"
"Who?" said I, frightened.
"De Saussure, of course."
"De Saussure! No indeed. I would a thousand times rather give
it to you, Hugh. But, I cannot."
"Then it will come," said he, taking my hand again; "if you
can say that, it will come. I will wait."
"No, it will not come," I said, as we looked one another in
the face. "I can be only a friend. May I not be that?"
He eyed me keenly, I saw, and my eyes for a moment fell. He
let go my hand again.
"Then, I understand," - he said. "Shall we go? I believe it is
time."
"Where is mamma?" I asked, looking about in some bewilderment
now.
"Mrs. Randolph and the rest have gone on; they are some
distance ahead of us by this time."
And what were they all thinking too, by this time! In great
dismay I turned to go after them with my unwelcome companion.
We walked in silence; I blaming myself greatly for stupidness
and blindness and selfish preoccupation, which had made me
look at nobody's affairs but my own; and grieving sadly too
for the mischief I had done.