She spoke with a gentle tinge of regret, nay almost of disillusion.

The bare suggestion of that regret stung Alan to the quick. He

felt it was shame to him that he could not rise at once to the

height of her splendid self-renunciation. "You mistake me,

dearest," he answered, petting her hand in his own (and she allowed

him to pet it). "It wasn't for myself, or for the world I

hesitated. My thought was for you. You are very young yet. You

say you have counted the cost. I wonder if you have. I wonder if

you realize it."

"Only too well," Herminia replied, in a very earnest mood. "I have

wrought it all out in my mind beforehand,--covenanted with my soul

that for women's sake I would be a free woman. Alan, whoever would

be free must himself strike the blow. I know what you will say,--

what every man would say to the woman he loved under similar

circumstances,--'Why should YOU be the victim? Why should YOU be

the martyr? Bask in the sun yourself; leave this doom to some

other.' But, Alan, I can't. I feel _I_ must face it. Unless one

woman begins, there will be no beginning." She lifted his hand in

her own, and fondled it in her turn with caressing tenderness.

"Think how easy it would be for me, dear friend," she cried, with

a catch in her voice, "to do as other women do; to accept the

HONORABLE MARRIAGE you offer me, as other women would call it; to

be false to my sex, a traitor to my convictions; to sell my kind

for a mess of pottage, a name and a home, or even for thirty pieces

of silver, to be some rich man's wife, as other women have sold it.

But, Alan, I can't. My conscience won't let me. I know what

marriage is, from what vile slavery it has sprung; on what unseen

horrors for my sister women it is reared and buttressed; by what

unholy sacrifices it is sustained, and made possible. I know it

has a history, I know its past, I know its present, and I can't

embrace it; I can't be untrue to my most sacred beliefs. I can't

pander to the malignant thing, just because a man who loves me

would be pleased by my giving way and would kiss me, and fondle me

for it. And I love you to fondle me. But I must keep my proper

place, the freedom which I have gained for myself by such arduous

efforts. I have said to you already, 'So far as my will goes, I am

yours; take me, and do as you choose with me.' That much I can

yield, as every good woman should yield it, to the man she loves,

to the man who loves her. But more than that, no. It would be

treason to my sex; not my life, not my future, not my individuality,

not my freedom."




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