“See here, old boy,” said Hawbury, “you may as well throw up the sponge.”

“I won’t,” said Dacres, gruffly.

“You see it isn’t your wife that you have to consider, but the girl; and do you think the girl or her friends would have a married man paying his attentions in that quarter?  Would you have the face to do it under your own wife’s eye?  By Jove!”

The undeniable truth of this assertion was felt by Dacres even in his rage.  But the very fact that it was unanswerable, and that he was helpless, only served to deepen and intensify his rage.  Yet he said nothing; it was only in his face and manner that his rage was manifested.  He appeared almost to suffocate under the rush of fierce, contending passions; big distended veins swelled out in his forehead, which was also drawn far down in a gloomy frown; his breath came thick and fast, and his hands were clenched tight together.  Hawbury watched him in silence as before, feeling all the time the impossibility of saying any thing that could be of any use whatever.

“Well, old fellow,” said Dacres at last, giving a long breath, in which he seemed to throw off some of his excitement, “you’re right, of course, and, I am helpless.  There’s no chance for me.  Paying attentions is out of the question, and the only thing for me to do is to give up the whole thing.  But that isn’t to be done at once.  It’s been long since I’ve seen any one for whom I felt any tenderness, and this little thing, I know, is fond of me.  I can’t quit her at once.  I must stay on for a time, at least, and have occasional glimpses at her.  It gives me a fresh sense of almost heavenly sweetness to look at her fair young face.  Besides, I feel that I am far more to her than any other man.  No other man has stood to her in the relation in which I have stood.  Recollect how I saved her from death.  That is no light thing.  She must feel toward me as she has never felt to any other.  She is not one who can forget how I snatched her from a fearful death, and brought her back to life.  Every time she looks at me she seems to convey all that to me in her glance.”

“Oh, well, my dear fellow, really now,” said Hawbury, “just think.  You can’t do any thing.”

“But I don’t want to do any thing.”

“It never can end in any thing, you know.”

“But I don’t want it to end in any thing.”

“You’ll only bother her by entangling her affections.”

“But I don’t want to entangle her affections.”

“Then what the mischief do you want to do?”

“Why, very little.  I’ll start off soon for the uttermost ends of the earth, but I wish to stay a little longer and see her sweet face.  It’s not much, is it?  It won’t compromise her, will it?  She need not run any risk, need she?  And I’m a man of honor, am I not?  You don’t suppose me to be capable of any baseness, do you?”

“My dear fellow, how absurd!  Of course not.  Only I was afraid by giving way to this you might drift on into a worse state of mind.  She’s all safe, I fancy, surrounded as she is by so many guardians.  It is you that I’m anxious about.”