I now fear that it
will remain with her and alter her for life. The discovery that I
have committed such an error in judgment as this makes me hesitate
about everything else. I hesitate about Sir Percival, in the face
of the plainest proofs. I hesitate even in speaking to Laura. On
this very morning I doubted, with my hand on the door, whether I
should ask her the questions I had come to put, or not.
When I went into her room I found her walking up and down in great
impatience. She looked flushed and excited, and she came forward
at once, and spoke to me before I could open my lips.
"I wanted you," she said. "Come and sit down on the sofa with me.
Marian! I can bear this no longer--I must and will end it."
There was too much colour in her cheeks, too much energy in her
manner, too much firmness in her voice. The little book of
Hartright's drawings--the fatal book that she will dream over
whenever she is alone--was in one of her hands. I began by gently
and firmly taking it from her, and putting it out of sight on a
side-table.
"Tell me quietly, my darling, what you wish to do," I said. "Has
Mr. Gilmore been advising you?"
She shook her head. "No, not in what I am thinking of now.
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