With one grand serpentine movement she came suddenly close to him, and, standing half behind him, laid her hand softly on his shoulder, and poured burning love in his ear. "Alfred," she murmured, "we are both unhappy; let us comfort one another. I had pity on you at Silverton House, I pity you now: pity _me_ a little in turn: take me out of this dreadful house, out of this revolting life, and let me be with you. Let me be your housekeeper, your servant, your slave. This news that has shocked you so has torn the veil from my eyes. I thought I had cooled my love down to friendship and tender esteem; but no, now I see you as unhappy as myself, now I can speak and wrong no one, I own I--oh Alfred my heart burns for you, bleeds for you, yearns for you, sickens for you, dies for you.""Oh, hush! hush! Mrs. Archbold. You are saying things you will blush for the next moment.""I blush now, but cannot hush; I have gone too far. And your happiness as well as mine is at stake. No young girl can understand or value such a man as you are: but I, like you, have suffered; I, like you, am constant;I, like you, am warm and tender; at my age a woman's love is bliss to him who can gain it; and I love you with all my soul, Alfred. I worship the ground you walk on, my sweet, sweet boy. Say you the word, dearest, and Iwill bribe the servants, and get the keys, and sacrifice my profession for ever to give you liberty (see how sweet the open face of nature is, sweeter than anything on earth, but love); and all I ask is a little, little of your heart in return. Give me a chance to make you mine for ever; and, if I fail, treat me as I shall deserve; desert me at once; and then I'll never reproach you; I'll only die for you; as I have lived for you ever since I first saw your heavenly face."The passionate woman paused at last, but her hot cheek and heaving bosom and tender convulsive hand prolonged the pleading.
I am afraid few men of her own age would have resisted her; for voice and speech and all burning, melting, and winning; and then, so reasonable, lads; she did not stipulate for constancy.
But Alfred turned round to her blushing and sorrowful. "For shame!" he said; "this is not love: you abuse that sacred word. Indeed, if you had ever really loved, you would have pitied me and Julia long ago, and respected our love; and saved us by giving me my freedom long ago. I am not a fool: do you think I don't know that you are my jailer, and the cunningest and most dangerous of them all?""You cruel, ungrateful!" she sobbed.
"No; I am not ungrateful either," said he more gently. "You have always come between me and that kind of torture which most terrifies vulgar souls: and I thank you for it. Only if you had also pitied the deeper anguish of my heart, I should thank you more still. As it is, I forgive you for the share you have had in blasting my happiness for life; and nobody shall ever know what you have been mad enough in an unguarded moment to say; but for pity's sake talk no more of love, to mock my misery."Mrs. Archbold was white with ire long before he had done this sentence.
"You insolent creature," said she; "you spurn my love; you shall feel my hate.""So I conclude," said he coldly: "such love as yours is hard by hate.""It is," said she: "and I know how I'll combine the two. To-day I loved you, and you spurned me; ere long you shall love me and I'll despise you;and not spurn you.""I don't understand you," said Alfred, feeling rather uneasy.
"What," said she, "don't you see how the superior mind can fascinate the inferior? Look at Frank Beverley--how he follows you about and fawns on you like a little dog.""I prefer his sort of affection to yours.""A gentleman and a man would have kept that to himself; but you are neither one nor the other; or you would have taken my offer, and then run away from me the next day, you fool. A man betrays a woman; he doesn't insult her. Ah, you admire Frank's affection; well, you shall imitate it.
You couldn't love me like a man; you shall love me like a dog.""How will you manage that, pray? " he inquired with a sneer.
"I'll drive you mad."
She hissed this fiendish threat out between her white teeth.
"Ay, sir," she said, "hitherto your reason has only encountered men. You shall see now what an insulted woman can do. A lunatic you shall be ere long, and then I'll make you love me, dote on me, follow me about for a smile: and then I'll leave off hating you, and love you once more, but not the way I did five minutes ago."At this furious threat Alfred ground his teeth, and said, "Then I give you my honour that the moment I see my reason the least shaken, I'll kill you: and so save myself from the degradation of being your lover on any terms.""Threaten your own sex with that," said the Archbold contemptuously; "you may kill me whenever you like; and the sooner the better. Only, if you don't do it very quickly, you shall be my property, my brain-sick, love-sick slave."