in the every-day
world, and be held by Waymark worthy to become his wife? He could not
certainly know, but there was little doubt that this hope had led her
on. Could he believe her capable of yet nobler ideas; could he think
that only in reverence of the sanctity of love, and without regard to
other things, she had acted in this way; then, regarding her as indeed
his equal, he would open his heart to her and speak somewhat in this
way. "Yes, I do love you; but at the same time I know too well the
uncertainty of love to go through the pretence of binding myself to you
for ever. Will you accept my love in its present sincerity, neither
hoping nor fearing, knowing that whatever happens is beyond our own
control, feeling with me that only an ignoble nature can descend to the
affectation of union when the real links are broken?" Could Waymark but
have felt sure of her answer to such an appeal, it would have gone far
to make his love for Ida all-engrossing. She would then be his ideal
woman, and his devotion to her would have no bounds.

But he felt too strongly that in thus speaking he would sadden her by
the destruction of her great hope. On the other hand, to offer to make
her his legal wife would be to do her a yet greater injustice, even had
he been willing to so sacrifice himself. The necessity for legal
marriage would be a confession of her inferiority, and the sense of
being thus bound would, he well knew, be the surest means of weakening
his affection. This affection he could not trust. How far was it mere
passion of the senses, which gratification would speedily kill?

In the case of his feeling towards Maud Enderby there was no such
doubt. Never was his blood so calm as in her presence. She was to him a
spirit, and in the spirit he loved her. With Maud he might look forward
to union at some distant day, a union outwardly of the conventional
kind. It would be so, not on account of any inferiority to his ideal in
Maud, for he felt that there was no height of his own thought whither
she would not in time follow him; but simply because no point of
principle would demand a refusal of the yoke of respectability, with
its attendant social advantages. And the thought of thus binding
himself to Maud had nothing repulsive, for the links between them were
not of the kind which easily yield, and loyalty to a higher and nobler
nature may well be deemed a duty.

So far logical arguing. But the fact remained that he had not th