I did turn my face half round
to her before I answered, and then felt that I had been cruel in
doing so. "Sir William," said I, "I have at home already a wife and
family of my own."
"It is not true!" said he, retreating a step, and staring at me with
amazement.
"There is something, sir," I replied, "in the unprecedented
circumstances of this meeting, and in your position with regard to
that lady, which, joined to your advanced age, will enable me to
regard that useless insult as unspoken. I am a married man. There
is the signature of my wife's last letter," and I handed him one
which I had received as I was leaving Jerusalem.
But the coarse violent contradiction which Sir William had given me
was nothing compared with the reproach conveyed in Miss Weston's
countenance. She looked at me as though all her anger were now
turned against me. And yet, methought, there was more of sorrow
than of resentment in her countenance. But what cause was there for
either? Why should I be reproached, even by her look? She did not
remember at the moment that when I answered her chance question as
to my domestic affairs, I had answered it as to a man who was a
stranger to me, and not as to a beautiful woman, with whom I was
about to pass certain days in close and intimate society.
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