Her father sat silent, with his face bent down. His breathing was a little quickened; but he repressed all other signs of agitation.

“Dear Doctor Manette, always knowing this, always seeing her and you with this hallowed light about you, I have forborne, and forborne, as long as it was in the nature of man to do it. I have felt, and do even now feel, that to bring my love⁠—even mine⁠—between you, is to touch your history with something not quite so good as itself. But I love her. Heaven is my witness that I love her!”

“I believe it,” answered her father, mournfully. “I have thought so before now. I believe it.”