CHAPTER XXXII 471
will marry, probably, some one who will make her far happier than I should do."
" You speak coolly enough; but you suffer in the conflict. You are wasting away."
" No. If I get a little thin, it is with anxiety about my prospects, yet unsettled-- my departure, continually procrastinated. Only this morning, I received intelligence that the successor, whose arrival I have been so long expecting, cannot be ready to replace me for three months to come yet; and perhaps the three months may extend to six."
" You tremble and become flushed whenever Miss Oliver enters the schoolroom."
Again the surprised expression crossed his face. He had not imagined that a woman would dare to speak so to a man. For me, I felt at home in this sort of discourse. I could never rest in communication with strong, discreet, and refined minds, whether male or female, till I had passed the outworks of conventional reserve, and crossed the threshold of confidence, and won a place by their heart ' s very hearthstone.
" You are original," said he, " and not timid. There is something brave in your spirit, as well as penetrating in your eye; but allow me to assure you that you partially misinterpret my emotions. You think them more profound and potent than they are. You give me a larger allowance of sympathy than I have a just claim to. When I colour, and when I shade before Miss Oliver, I do not pity myself. I scorn the weakness. I know it is ignoble: a mere fever of the flesh: not, I declare, the convulsion of the soul. THAT is just as fixed as a rock, firm set in the depths of a restless sea. Know me to be what I am-- a cold hard man."
I smiled incredulously.
" You have taken my confidence by storm," he continued, " and now it is much at your service. I am simply, in my original state-- stripped of that