"I must," he persisted. "Darling, I speak with deepest love and pity, yet with unwavering firmness. You cannot think that, with that terrible stain resting on you, you can take your place here."
"But I am your wife!" she cried, in wild terror.
"You are my wife," he returned, with quivering lips; "but you must remain so in name only." He paused abruptly, for it seemed to him that the words burned his lips as they passed them. "My wife," he muttered, "in name only."
With a deep sob she stretched out her arms. "But I love you, Norman--you must not send me away! I love you--I shall die if I have to leave you!"
"My darling," he said, gently, "it is even harder for me than for you."
"No, no," she cried, "for I love you so dearly, Norman--better than my life! Darling, my whole heart went out to you long ago--you cannot give it back to me."
"If it kills you and myself too," he declared, hoarsely, "I must send you away."
"Send me away? Oh, no, Norman, not away! Let me stay with you, husband, darling. We were married only this morning My place is here by your side--I cannot go."
Looking away from her, with those passionate accents still ringing in his ears, his only answer was:
"Norman," she implored, "listen to me, dear! Do not send me away from you. I will be so good, so devoted. I will fulfill my duties so well, I will bear myself so worthily that no one shall remember anything against me; they shall forget my unhappy birth, and think only that you have chosen well. Oh, Norman, be merciful to me! Leaving you would be a living death!"
"You cannot suffer more than I do," he said--"and I would give my life to save you pain; but, my darling, I cannot be so false to the traditions of my race, so false to the honor of my house, so untrue to my ancestors and to myself, as to ask you to stay here. There has never been a blot on our name. The annals of our family are pure and stainless. I could not ask you to remain here and treat you as my wife, even to save my life!"
"I have done no wrong, Norman; why should you punish me so cruelly?"
"No, my darling, you have done no wrong--and the punishment is more mine than yours. I lose the wife whom I love most dearly--I lose my all."
"Not so much as I do, because you are the fairest and sweetest of women. You shall live in all honor, Madaline. You shall never suffer social degradation, darling--the whole world shall know that I hold you blameless; but you can be my wife in name only."