“And I so young. In this condition, father⁠—for I show you now, without fear or favour, the ordinary deadened state of my mind as I know it⁠—you proposed my husband to me. I took him. I never made a pretence to him or you that I loved him. I knew, and, father, you knew, and he knew, that I never did. I was not wholly indifferent, for I had a hope of being pleasant and useful to Tom. I made that wild escape into something visionary, and have slowly found out how wild it was. But Tom had been the subject of all the little tenderness of my life; perhaps he became so because I knew so well how to pity him. It matters little now, except as it may dispose you to think more leniently of his errors.”

As her father held her in his arms, she put her other hand upon his other shoulder, and still looking fixedly in his face, went on.