She looked up at him with an alarmed expression. It was the first time he had ever uttered her Christian name, but his tone was so serious as to make that a minor question. "You cannot guess, I suppose," he went on, "I've made a discovery--a most perplexing, most calamitous discovery." "What is that?" "I have found out that I love you." Her hand was lying on the broad stone ledge. He took it in his firm grasp, and held it as he went on: "Yes, Clarissa; I had my doubts before I went away, but thought I was master of myself in this, as I have been in other things, and fancied myself strong enough to strangle the serpent. But it would not be strangled, Clarissa; it has wound itself about my heart, and here I sit by your side dishonoured in my own sight, come what may--bound to one woman and loving another with all my soul--yes, with all my soul. What am I to do?" "Your duty," Clarissa answered, in a low steady voice. Her heart was beating so violently that she wondered at her power to utter those two words. What was it that she felt--anger, indignation? Alas, no; Pride, delight, rapture, stirred that undisciplined heart. She knew now what was wanted to make her life bright and happy; she knew now that she had loved George Fairfax almost from the first. And her own duty--the duty she was bound in honour to perform--what was that? Upon that question she had not a moment's doubt. Her duty was to resign him without a murmur; never to let him know that he had touched her heart. Even after having done this, there would be much left to her--the knowledge that he had loved her. "My duty! what is that?" he asked in a hoarse hard voice. "To keep faith with Geraldine, whatsoever misery it may bring upon both of us? I am not one of those saints who think of everybody's happiness before their own, Clarissa. I am very human, with all humanity's selfishness. I want to be happy. I want a wife for whom I can feel something more than a cold well-bred liking. I did not think that it was in me to feel more than that. I thought I had outlived my capacity for loving, wasted the strength of my heart's youth on worthless fancies, spent all my patrimony of affection; but the light shines on me again, and I thank God that it is so. Yes, Clarissa, come what may, I thank my God that I am not so old a man in heart and feeling as I thought myself." Clarissa tried to stem the current of his talk, with her heart still beating stormily, but with semblance of exceeding calmness. "I must not hear you talk in this wild way, Mr. Fairfax," she said. "I feel as if I had been guilty of a sin against Lady Geraldine in having listened so long. But I cannot for a moment think you are in earnest." "Do not play the Jesuit, Clarissa. You _know_ that I am in earnest." "Then the railway accident must have turned your brain, and I can only hope that to-morrow morning will restore your reason."