"No harm," I said, "to think so ill of me! To believe, for a single moment, that because I am not so poor, I would go and forsake--at least, I mean, forget--any one I cared for!" "Can I ever hope, if I serve you all my life, that you will ever care for me?" "Don’t you know I do?" And I burst into my violent flood. When I came to myself, both his arms were round me, and I was looking up at his poor sick face, my hair quite full of marble chips, and he was telling me with glad tears in his eyes, which he never took from mine, how he cared for nothing now, not for all the world, not for glory or fur shame, so long as I only loved him. "With all my heart and soul," I whispered, "him and no one else whatever, whether in life or death." All the folly we went through I am not going to repeat, though I remember well every atom of it. Let the wise their wisdom keep, we are babes and sucklings. Neither of us had ever loved before, or ever meant to love again, except of course each other, and that should be for ever. "One thing I must tell you, my own sweet love, and yet I fear to do it. But you are not like other girls. There is no one like you, nor has there ever been. I think you will not scorn me for another’s fault." "Of course I won’t, my own pet Conny. What is this awful thing?" "I am an illegitimate son." One moment I sprang from him; the next I despised myself. But in spite of all my troubles, there still lurked in my heart the narrow pride of birth. Down to the earth it fell beneath the foot of true love, and I kissed away from his eyes the mingled reproach and sorrow, assuring him that at least he should have a legitimate wife. To make amends, I leaned upon him one moment, and put my hand on his shoulder, and let him play awhile with the dark shower of my hair. "Darling Conny, you have told me yours, now you shall hear my secret. Only promise me you will give tit for tat. You say you loved me ever since you saw me first; then you must have loved your Clara when you saved her life." "What do you mean, my Clara? Those low ruffians in the Park were not going to kill you." "No, dearest; I don’t mean that at all. But there’s a kiss for that, I have owed it you ever since. But what I mean no kisses can repay; no, nor a life of love. You saved a life worth fifty of my own." Some dark alarm was growing in his eyes, on which I gazed with vague increasing terror. "Why, dearest, it is nothing. Only your own Clara is not Clara Valence; you must call her ’Clara Vaughan.’" With actual violence he thrust me from his arms, and stood staring at me, while I trembled from head to foot; his face was one scarlet flame. "And pray, Sir, what harm have I done? Am I to suppose that you"--special emphasis meant for illegitimacy--"that you are ashamed of my father and me?" "Yes, I am. Accursed low licentious race! If you knew what you have done, you would tear your heart out rather than give it to me."