After some careless talk of commonplaces he managed at last to secure the chair beside Florence’s sofa, and affected to take an interest in some work she was engaged at. “I have been anxious to see you and speak to you, Florry,” said he, in a low tone, not audible by the others. “I had a letter from Loyd, written just before he left. He has told me everything.” She only bent down her head more deeply over her work, but did not speak. “Yes; he was more candid than you,” continued he. “He said you were engaged--that is--that you had owned to him that you liked him, and that when the consent he hoped for would be obtained, you would be married.” “How came he to write this to _you?_” said she, with a slight tremor in her voice. “In this wise,” said he, calmly. “He felt that he owed me an apology for something that had occurred between us on that morning; and, when making his excuses, he deemed he could give no better proof of frankness than by this avowal. It was, besides, an act of fairness towards one who, trusting to his own false light, might have been lured to delusive hopes.” “Perhaps so,” said she, coldly. “It was very right of him, very proper.” She nodded. “It was more--it was generous.” “He _is_ generous,” said she, warmly. “He had need be.” “How do you mean, that he had need be?” asked she, eagerly. “I mean this--that he will require every gift he has, and every grace, to outbalance the affection which I bear you--which I shall never cease to bear you. You prefer him. Now, you may regard me how you will--I will not consent to believe myself beaten. Yes, Florence, I know not only that I love you more than he does, but I love you with a love he is incapable of feeling. I do not wish to say one word in his dispraise, least of all to you, in whose favour I want to stand well; but I wish you--and it is no unfair request--to prove the affection of the two men who solicit your love.” “I am satisfied with his.” “You may be satisfied with the version your own imagination renders of it. You may be satisfied with the picture you have coloured for yourself; but I want you to be just to yourself, and just to me. Now if I can show you in his own handwriting--the ink only dried on the paper a day ago--a letter from him to me, in which he asks my pardon in terms so abject as never were wrung from any man, except under the pressure of a personal fear?” “You say this to outrage me. Aunt Grainger,” cried she, in a voice almost a scream, “listen to what this gentleman has had the temerity to tell me. Repeat it now, Sir, if you dare.” “What is this, Mr. Calvert? You have not surely presumed--” “I have simply presumed, Madam, to place my pretensions in rivalry with Mr. Loyd’s. I have been offering to your niece the half of a very humble fortune, with a name not altogether ignoble.”