"What can I do, cousin? What can I do? Tell me! I love
you. Tell me, use me kindly; teach me to do right and keep my honor
bright as you could desire it were I to be your wife!"
It was that appeal, I think, that brought me back through the distorted
shadows of my passion; through the dark pit of envy, past snares of
jealousy and malice, and the traps and pitfalls dug by Satan, safe to
the trembling rock of honor once again.
Like a blind man healed by miracle, yet still groping in the precious
light that mazed him, so I peering with aching eyes for those threads to
guide me in my stunned perplexity. But when at last I felt their touch,
I found I held one already--the thread of hope--and whether for good or
evil I did not drop it, but gathered all together and wove them to a
rope to hold by.
"What is it I must swear," I asked, cold to the knees.
"Never again to kiss me."
"Never again."
"Nor to caress me."
"Nor to caress you."
"Nor speak of love."
"Nor speak of love."
"And ... that is all," she faltered.
"No, not all. I swear to love you always, never to forget you, never to
prove unworthy in your eyes, never to wed; living, to honor you; dying,
with your name upon my lips."
She had stretched out her arms towards me as though warning me to stop;
but, as I spoke slowly, weighing each word and its cost, her hands
trembled and sought each other so that she stood looking at me, fingers
interlocked and her sweet face as white as death.
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