"I am so glad, so very glad, and so surprised, too, Cousin Edward,
at your success. And yet you kept it all to yourself. You might
have told ME, at least, that you were studying law. Why was it
that I was never allowed to know of your intention?"
"Your father knew it, Julia."
"Yes, so he says now. He says you told him something about it when
you first went into a store; but he did not think you in earnest."
"Not in earnest! He little knew me, Julia."
"But your telling him, Edward, was not telling me. Why did you not
tell me?"
"You might not have kept my secret, Julia. You know what naughty
things are said of your sex, touching your inability to keep a
secret."
"Naughty things, indeed--naughty and untrue! I'm sure, I should
have kept your secret, if you desired it. But why should it be a
secret?"
"Why, indeed!" I muttered, as the shadow of my perverseness passed
deeply over my heart. "Why, unless to protect myself from the sneers
which would stifle my ambition, and the sarcasm which would have
stung my heart," "But you have no fear of these from me, Cousin Edward," she said
gently, and with dewy eyes, while her fingers slightly pressed upon
my wrist.
"I know not that, Cousin Julia, I somehow suspect everything and
everybody now. I feel very lonely in the world--as if there was a
destiny at work to make my whole life one long conflict, which I
must carry on without sympathy or succor."
"Oh, these are only notions, Edward."
"Notions!" I exclaimed, giving her a bitter smile as I spoke, while
my thoughts reverted to the three years of unremitting and almost
uncheered labor through which I had passed.
"Yes, notions only, Cousin Edward. You are full of such notions.
You every now and then start up with a new one; and it makes you
gloomy and discontented--"
"I make no complaints, Julia."
"No, that is the worst of it. You make no complaints, I think,
because you do not wish to be cured of them. You prefer nursing
your supposed cause of grief, with a sort of solitary pleasure--the
gratification of a haughty spirit, that is too proud to seek for
solace, and to find it."
Julia had in truth touched upon the true nature of my misanthropy
--of that self vexing and self-torturing spirit which too effectually
blinds the heart.
"But could I find it, Julia?" I asked, looking into her eyes with
an expression which I began to feel was something very new to mine.
"Perhaps--I think--you could," was the half-tremulous answer, as
she beheld the peculiar expression of my glance. The entrance of
Mrs. Clifford, was, perhaps, for the first time, rather a relief
to us both.