A short pause of mutual thoughtfulness succeeded. Willoughby first rousing himself, broke it thus: "Well, let me make haste and be gone. Your sister is certainly better, certainly out of danger?"
"We are assured of it."
"Your poor mother, too!--doting on Marianne."
"But the letter, Mr. Willoughby, your own letter; have you any thing to say about that?"
"Yes, yes, THAT in particular. Your sister wrote to me again, you know, the very next morning. You saw what she said. I was breakfasting at the Ellisons,--and her letter, with some others, was brought to me there from my lodgings. It happened to catch Sophia's eye before it caught mine--and its size, the elegance of the paper, the hand-writing altogether, immediately gave her a suspicion. Some vague report had reached her before of my attachment to some young lady in Devonshire, and what had passed within her observation the preceding evening had marked who the young lady was, and made her more jealous than ever. Affecting that air of playfulness, therefore, which is delightful in a woman one loves, she opened the letter directly, and read its contents. She was well paid for her impudence. She read what made her wretched. Her wretchedness I could have borne, but her passion--her malice--At all events it must be appeased. And, in short--what do you think of my wife's style of letter-writing?--delicate--tender--truly feminine--was it not?"
"Your wife!--The letter was in your own hand-writing."
"Yes, but I had only the credit of servilely copying such sentences as I was ashamed to put my name to. The original was all her own--her own happy thoughts and gentle diction. But what could I do!--we were engaged, every thing in preparation, the day almost fixed--But I am talking like a fool. Preparation!--day!--In honest words, her money was necessary to me, and in a situation like mine, any thing was to be done to prevent a rupture. And after all, what did it signify to my character in the opinion of Marianne and her friends, in what language my answer was couched?--It must have been only to one end. My business was to declare myself a scoundrel, and whether I did it with a bow or a bluster was of little importance.-- 'I am ruined for ever in their opinion--' said I to myself--'I am shut out for ever from their society, they already think me an unprincipled fellow, this letter will only make them think me a blackguard one.' Such were my reasonings, as, in a sort of desperate carelessness, I copied my wife's words, and parted with the last relics of Marianne. Her three notes--unluckily they were all in my pocketbook, or I should have denied their existence, and hoarded them for ever--I was forced to put them up, and could not even kiss them. And the lock of hair--that too I had always carried about me in the same pocket-book, which was now searched by Madam with the most ingratiating virulence,--the dear lock--all, every memento was torn from me."