He looked down at me with an anxious and tormenting doubt that vanished before a sudden and irresistible conviction. Yes, I read it in his face: he who had so pertinaciously accused, judged, and condemned me, was now, as with a two-edged sword, pierced with the double conviction of my innocence and his own injustice. For a moment he looked stunned, then he withdrew from my clasp, rose, and walked away without a word, and sat down by the table with his back turned to me. The heart has instincts beyond all the written knowledge of the wise. I rose and ran to him; he averted his face and put me away. "Cornelius," I entreated, "Cornelius, look at me." Without answering, he turned his face to me. Never shall I forget its mingled remorse and grief. He rose and paced the room up and down, with agitated steps. I did not dare to follow or address him; of his own accord he stopped short and, confronting me, took my two hands in his and looked down at me with a sorrowful face. "If I had but wronged a man," he said, "one who could give me back insult for insult and wrong for wrong, I should regret it, but I could forgive myself; but you!" he added, looking at me from head to foot, "a girl, a mere child, dependent on me too, helpless and without one to protect or defend you against wrong--oh, Daisy! it is more than I can bear to think of!" It did seem too galling for thought, for tears wrung forth by wounded pride rose to his eyes and ran down his burning cheek. "Can you forgive me?" he added, after a short pause. This was more than I could bear. Forgive him! forgive him to whom I owed everything the error of one day! I could not, and I passionately said I never would. But Cornelius was peremptory, and, though burning with shame at so strange a reversion of our mutual positions, I yielded. I felt however as if I could never again look him in the face. But Cornelius had a faculty granted to few: he could feel deeply, ardently, without sentimental exaggeration. His mind was manly in its very tenderness. He had expressed his grief, his remorse, his shame; he did not brood over them or distress me with puerile because unavailing regrets over a past he could not recall. As he made me return to my seat and again sat by me, there was indeed in his look, in the way in which he drew me nearer to him, in the tone with which he said once or twice, "My poor child! my poor little Daisy!" something which told me beyond the power of language, how keenly he felt his injustice, how deeply he lamented my day of sorrow; but otherwise, his conscience acquitting him of intentional wrong, he accepted my forgiveness as frankly as he had asked for it.