"What is it you cannot undo? Since you confess, that if they
desired, you would undo the whole."
"Not my faith, nor my affection," - I said, slowly. "Some
things they may forbid, and I obey; but these things are
passed beyond their power, and beyond mine. I will be true. I
cannot help it now, if I would."
"But, Daisy -" said Miss Cardigan, and she was evidently
perplexed now herself. - "Since you are ready to obey them in
the utmost and give up Thorold if they say so, what is there,
my dear, which your father and mother could command now in
which you are not ready to obey them?"
"The time has not come, Miss Cardigan," I said. "It may be -
you know it may be - long, before they need know anything
about it; before, I mean, anything could be done. I am going
abroad - Christian will be busy here - and they might tell me
not to think of him and not to write to him; and - I can't
live so. It is fair to give him and myself the chance. It is
fair that they should know him and see him before they hear
what he wants of them; or at least before they answer it."
"Give him and yourself the chance - of what, Daisy?"
"I don't know," I said faint-heartedly. "Of what time may do."
"Then you think -my dear, you augur ill of your father's and
mother's opinion of your engagement?"
"I can't help it now, Miss Cardigan," I said; and I know I
spoke firmly then. "I did not know what I was doing - I did
not know what was coming. If I had known, if I could have
helped myself, I think I ought not to have loved anybody or
let anybody speak to me without my father and mother choosing
it; but it was all done before I could in the least help it;
and you know I cannot help it now. I owe something besides to
them now. I will not disobey them in anything I can help; -
but I will be true, - as long as I live."
Miss Cardigan sat a long while silent, holding my hand all the
while; sometimes clasping, and sometimes fondling it. Then she
turned and kissed me. It was very hard to bear, all of it.
"I suppose you are a great heiress," she said at last; as if
the words escaped her, and with a breath of a sigh.