“I am starting on a long journey, my cousin,” he said, “and I would see you before I go. You will not think unkindly of me when----”
She could make no answer but only bent over his hand to hide the tears that were welling to her eyes, though she strove to repress them.
“This is a fit end for me,” he went on, “but, believe me, I tried to keep my promise toward your brother; he did not understand and----”
“You must say no more,” said Dorothy; “I never doubted of your faith and honour. You will yet live to know that I trust you.”
“Too late, too late!” he said, sorrowfully. “Why should I live? I have had my chance and wasted it. In all the world there is no one who will regret me but yourself, and you will forget me when--it is but right you should. Victor De Laprade--a stranger--that is all, and I deserve no better.”
“I will never forget you,” she said, touched beyond expression by the pathos of his speech; “you must not think such thoughts; you will yet live to smile at them.”
“Why should I live for whom there is no room and no need? I have wasted my life. As I lay here I have lived it all again, and seen its folly. You have helped me to see what I never saw before, and I could not go before I told you. Nay, it is best for me to die. It is not hard to say farewell with your hand in mine. I had hoped some day to tell you what I am going to speak, some day when I had shown myself not altogether unworthy, but I cannot wait for that now, and must say it here if it is ever to be spoken.”
She knew what he was about to say; full of pity she did not withdraw her hand, but continued to hold his in her own. At that moment she almost felt she loved the man who looked at her with such fervent longing in his eyes.
“I have come to love you, my cousin, with such love as I never felt or dreamed of before--a love that makes me ashamed of my life, and desire to forget the past and all its follies. That love has taken the terror away from death. I do not think I should have made you happy. I had too much to forget. And you know you did not love me, Dorothy; as indeed why should you.”
“Indeed, I think I do,” she answered honestly, and lifted his hand to her lips with the tears in her eyes. “Oh! Victor, do not wrong yourself in speaking thus.”