He obeyed her, and she drew his head upon her breast and kissed his lips.
'There's no question--no doubt of the love between us, Saul?'
'If some chance were to part us this night, and I was never to look upon your face again----'
--'And I was never to look upon your face again,' she repeated with a cheerful smile, 'I should, if I lived to be an old woman, and you to be an old man, never for one moment doubt that you loved me through all the years.'
'It is like you, Jane; your faith would not be misplaced.'
'I know it, and I know that you would be to me the same--you would believe that no other man could hold the place in my heart that you have always held.'
He took her in his arms, and said that she was his anchor; that as nothing on earth could shake her faith in him, so nothing on earth could shake his faith in her; after what she had said (although he knew it before, and would have staked his worthless life on it) could she still refuse to allow him to make her the only reparation it was in his power to make?
She waived the question for the present and said,
'Then you must not speak of drifting,' she said tenderly; 'we have drifted low enough. Remember, Saul,' and she took his hand in hers, and looked into his eyes, 'we have not ourselves alone to think of. There is another. It only needs resolution. Come--let us talk of it Here, there is no hope.'
'There seems none, Jane; all heart has left me.'
'Elsewhere things might be better for you.'
'For us,' he said, correcting her. 'What is better for you is better for me,' she replied. 'I heard today that George Naldret----'
'Amen! God bless him! I heard to-day that he was going away sooner than was expected.'
'I heard so too, Jane; and I went round to Mrs. Naldret's tonight to see him if I could. But he had not come home.'
'Saul,' she said, hiding her face on his shoulder, and pressing him in her arms, as one might do who was about to lose what she loved best in this world, 'we have suffered much together; our love for each other seems to keep us down.'
'It is I--I only who am to blame. I commenced life badly, and went from bad to worse.'
She placed her hand upon his lips, and stopped farther self-accusation.
'It is a blessing for many,' she said, 'that those new lands have been discovered. A man can commence a new life there without being crushed by the misfortunes or faults of the past, if he be earnest enough to acquire strength. It might be a blessing to you.'