I used to find so many
things with you, in the happy times that used to be." Blyth saw that her
eyelids were quivering with tears. "I will go away, if you would rather
have it so. But you used to be so good-natured to me."
"So I am still. Or at least I mean that people should now be
good-natured to me. Oh, Captain Scudamore, how foolish I have been!"
"Don't say so, don't think it, don't believe it for a moment," said
Scudamore, scarcely knowing what he said, as she burst into a storm of
sobbing. "Oh, Dolly, Dolly, you know you meant no harm. You are breaking
your darling heart, when you don't deserve it. I could not bear to look
at you, and think of it, this morning. Everybody loves you still, as
much and more than ever. Oh, Dolly, I would rather die than see you cry
so terribly."
"Nobody loves me, and I hate myself. I could never have believed I
should ever hate myself. Go away, you are too good to be near me. Go
away, or I shall think you want to kill me. And I wish you would do it,
Captain Scudamore."
"Then let me stop," said the Captain, very softly. She smiled at the
turn of his logic, through her tears. Then she wept with new anguish,
that she had no right to smile.
"Only tell me one thing--may I hold you? Not of course from any right to
do it, but because you are so overcome, my own, own Dolly." The Captain
very cleverly put one arm round her, at first with a very light touch,
and then with a firmer clasp, as she did not draw away.
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