"We must wait, my dear, while there is uncertainty or war."
"But you haven't the right to make me wait!" she cried, her voice
warming to mingled rage, reproach, and threat. "Why, wars last for
years--I should be an old woman! You're not free to deny me this
pleasure, or postpone it an hour! You promised it from the first, you
encouraged my anticipations until I came to live upon them, you fed my
hopes till they dropped everything else in the world. Night and day I
have looked forward to it, thought of it, dreamt of it! And now you
say I must wait--months, at least; probably years! But you can't mean
it, Phil! You wouldn't be so cruel! Tell me!"
"I mean no cruelty, dear. But one has no choice when patriotism
dictates--when one's country--"
"Why, you sha'n't treat me so, disappoint me so! 'Twould be breaking
your word; 'twould be a cruel betrayal, no less; 'twould make all your
conduct since our marriage--nay, since that very day we promised
marriage--a deception, a treachery, a lie; winning a woman's hand and
keeping her love, upon a false pretence! You _dare_ not turn back on
your word now! If you are a man of honour, of truth, of common
honesty, you will let this miserable war go hang, and take me to
England, as you promised! And if you don't I'll hate you!--hate you!"
Her speech had come out in a torrent of increasing force, until her
voice was almost a scream, and this violence had its climax in a
hysterical outburst of weeping, as she sank upon a chair and hid her
face upon the back thereof.
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