He went and leaned on the back of the chair again, and seemed to be battling with his own anger, while she looked towards him sadly.
“It is as fatal as a murder or any other horror that divides people,” he burst out again; “it is more intolerable—to have our life maimed by petty accidents.”
“No—don’t say that—your life need not be maimed,” said Dorothea, gently.
“Yes, it must,” said Will, angrily. “It is cruel of you to speak in that way—as if there were any comfort. You may see beyond the misery of it, but I don’t. It is unkind—it is throwing back my love for you as if it were a trifle, to speak in that way in the face of the fact. We can never be married.”
“Some time—we might,” said Dorothea, in a trembling voice.
“When?” said Will, bitterly. “What is the use of counting on any success of mine? It is a mere toss up whether I shall ever do more than keep myself decently, unless I choose to sell myself as a mere pen and a mouthpiece. I can see that clearly enough. I could not offer myself to any woman, even if she had no luxuries to renounce.”
There was silence. Dorothea’s heart was full of something that she wanted to say, and yet the words were too difficult. She was wholly possessed by them: at that moment debate was mute within her. And it was very hard that she could not say what she wanted to say. Will was looking out of the window angrily. If he would have looked at her and not gone away from her side, she thought everything would have been easier. At last he turned, still resting against the chair, and stretching his hand automatically towards his hat, said with a sort of exasperation, “Good-bye.”
“Oh, I cannot bear it—my heart will break,” said Dorothea, starting from her seat, the flood of her young passion bearing down all the obstructions which had kept her silent—the great tears rising and falling in an instant: “I don’t mind about poverty—I hate my wealth.”
In an instant Will was close to her and had his arms round her, but she drew her head back and held his away gently that she might go on speaking, her large tear-filled eyes looking at his very simply, while she said in a sobbing childlike way, “We could live quite well on my own fortune—it is too much—seven hundred a-year—I want so little—no new clothes—and I will learn what everything costs.”
