"Do you mind that you know few of her tastes or habits? I speak of this as a general truth." "I am a spectacle to you, I suppose. But this sea charms me; I shall live by it, and build a house with all the windows and doors toward it." "Not if you mean to have Verry in it." "I do mean to have her in it. She shall like it. Are you willing to have me for a brother? Will you go to Belem, and help break the ice? _She_ could never go," and he began to skip pebbles in the water. "I will take you for a brother gladly. You are a fool--not for loving her, but all men are fools when in love, they are so besotted with themselves. But I am afraid of one fault in you." "Yes," he answered hurriedly, "don't I know? On my honor, I have tried; why not leave me to God? Didn't you leave yourself that way once?" "Oh, you are cruel." "Pardon me, dear Cass. I _must_ do well now, surely. Will you believe in me? Oh, do you not know the strength, the power, that comes to us in the stress of passion and duty?" "This is from _you_, Ben." "Never mind; I knew I wanted to marry her, when I saw her. I love her passionately," and he threw a pebble in the water farther than he had yet; "but she is so pure, so delicate, that when I approach her, in spite of my besottedness, my love grows lambent. That's not like me, you know," with great vehemence. "Will she never understand me?" His face darkened, and he looked so strangely intent into my eyes that I was obliged to turn away; he disturbed me. "Veronica probably will not understand you, but you must manage for yourself. As you have discerned, she and I are far apart. She is pure, noble, beautiful, and peculiar. I will have no voice between you." "You must, you do. We shall hear it if you do not speak. You have a great power, tall enchantress." "Certainly. What a powerful life is mine!" "You come to these shores often. Are you not different beside them? This colorless picture before us--these vague spaces of sea and land--the motion of the one--the stillness of the other--have you no sense that you have a powerful spirit?" "Is it power? It is pain." "Your gold has not been refined then." "Yes, I confess I have a sense of power; but it is not a spiritual sense." "Let us go back," he said abruptly. We mused by our footprints in the wet sand, as we passed them. We were told when we reached home that Veronica had gone on some expedition with Fanny. She did not return till time for supper, looking elfish, and behaving whimsically, as if she had received instructions accordingly. I fancied that the expression Ben regarded her with might be the Bellevue Pickersgill expression, it was so different from any I had seen. There was a haughty curiosity in his face; as she passed near him, he looked into her eyes, and saw the strange cast which made their sight so far off. "Veronica, where are you?" he asked.