The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope (best fiction novels of all time .TXT) 📕

youth, and almost made her weep. That a man⁠—such a man⁠—should offer to take half her burdens, and to confer upon her half his blessings! What an idiot! But what a God! She had looked upon the man as all intellect, alloyed perhaps by some passionless remnants of the vices of his youth; and now she found that he not only had a human heart in his bosom, but a heart that she could touch. How wonderfully sweet! How infinitely small!

It was necessary that she should answer him⁠—and to her it was only natural that she should at first think what answer would best assist her own views without reference to his. It did not occur to her that she could love him; but it did occur to her that he might lift her out of her difficulties. What a benefit it would be to her to have a father, and such a father, for Felix! How easy would be a literary career to the wife of the editor of the Morning Breakfast Table! And then it passed through her mind that somebody had told her that the man was paid £3,000 a year for his work. Would not the world, or any part of it that was desirable, come to her drawing-room if she were the wife of Mr. Broune? It all passed through her brain at once during that minute of silence which she allowed herself after the declaration was made to her. But other ideas and other feelings were present to her also. Perhaps the truest aspiration of her heart had been the love of freedom which the tyranny of her late husband had engendered. Once she had fled from that tyranny and had been almost crushed by the censure to which she had been subjected. Then her husband’s protection and his tyranny had been restored to her. After that the freedom had come. It had been accompanied by many hopes never as yet fulfilled, and embittered by many sorrows which had been always present to her; but still the hopes were alive and the remembrance of the tyranny was very clear to her. At last the minute was over and she was bound to speak. “Mr. Broune,” she said, “you have quite taken away my breath. I never expected anything of this kind.”

And now Mr. Broune’s mouth was opened, and his voice was free. “Lady Carbury,” he said, “I have lived a long time without marrying, and I have sometimes thought that it would be better for me to go on in the same way to the end. I have worked so hard all my life that when I was young I had no time to think of love. And, as I have gone on, my mind has been so fully employed, that I have hardly realised the want which nevertheless I have felt. And so it has been with me till I fancied, not that I was too old for love, but that others would think me so. Then I met you. As I said at first, perhaps with scant gallantry, you also are not as young as you once were. But you keep the beauty of your youth, and the energy, and something of the freshness of a young heart. And I have come to love you. I speak with absolute frankness, risking your anger. I have doubted much before I resolved upon this. It is so hard to know the nature of another person. But I think I understand yours;⁠—and if you can confide your happiness with me, I am prepared to entrust mine to your keeping.” Poor Mr. Broune! Though endowed with gifts peculiarly adapted for the editing of a daily newspaper, he could have had but little capacity for reading a woman’s character when he talked of the freshness of Lady Carbury’s young mind! And he must have surely been much blinded by love, before convincing himself that he could trust his happiness to such keeping.

“You do me infinite honour. You pay me a great compliment,” ejaculated Lady Carbury.

“Well?”

“How am I to answer you at a moment? I expected nothing of this. As God is to be my judge it has come upon me like a dream. I look upon your position as almost the highest in England⁠—on your prosperity as the uttermost that can be achieved.”

“That prosperity, such as it is, I desire most anxiously to share with you.”

“You tell me so;⁠—but I can hardly yet believe it. And then how am I to know my own feelings so suddenly? Marriage as I have found it, Mr. Broune, has not been happy. I have suffered much. I have been wounded in every joint, hurt in every nerve⁠—tortured till I could hardly endure my punishment. At last I got my liberty, and to that I have looked for happiness.”

“Has it made you happy?”

“It has made me less wretched. And there is so much to be considered! I have a son and a daughter, Mr. Broune.”

“Your daughter I can love as my own. I think I prove my devotion to you when I say that I am willing for your sake to encounter the troubles which may attend your son’s future career.”

“Mr. Broune, I love him better⁠—always shall love him better⁠—than anything in the world.” This was calculated to damp the lover’s ardour, but he probably reflected that should he now be successful, time might probably change the feeling which had just been expressed. “Mr. Broune,” she said, “I am now so agitated that you had better leave me. And it is very late. The servant is sitting up, and will wonder that you should remain. It is near two o’clock.”

“When may I hope for an answer?”

“You shall not be kept waiting. I will write to you, almost at once. I will write to you⁠—tomorrow; say the day after tomorrow, on Thursday. I feel that I ought to have been prepared with an answer; but I am so surprised that I have none ready.” He took her hand in