I shall not tell her. I have
suffered enough for a youthful folly; an act of mad generosity. I refuse
to allow an infamous woman to wreck my future life as she has disgraced my
past. Legally, she has passed out of it; morally, legally, she is not my
wife. For all I know she may be actually dead.'
The other was watching his face, very gray and old now, with an anxious
compassion.
'You know she is not dead, Sebastian,' he said simply. Then he added very
quietly as one breaks supreme bad tidings, 'I must tell you something
which I fear you have not realised. The Catholic Church does not recognise
divorce. If she marry you and find out, rightly or wrongly, she will
believe that she has been living in sin; some day she will find it out.
No damnable secret like that keeps itself for ever: an old newspaper, a
chance remark from one of your dear friends, and the deluge. Do you see the
tragedy, the misery of it? By God, Sebastian, to save you both somebody
shall tell her; and if it be not you, it must be I.'
There was extremest peace in the quiet square; the houses seemed sleepy
at last, after a day of exhausting tranquillity, and the chestnuts, under
which a few children, with tangled hair and fair dirty faces, still played.
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