talked all night, though she convinced him according to all the laws and
principles of logic, she knew that he would still think precisely what
he had thought in the beginning, for his conviction was rooted, deeper
than reason, in the unconquerable prejudices which had passed from the
brain into the very blood of his race. He would probably say at the end:
"I admit all that you tell me, Gabriella, but my sentiment is against
it;" and this sentiment, overruling sense, would insist, with sublime
obstinacy, that Gabriella must not work in a shop. It would ignore,
after the exalted habit of sentiment, such merely sordid facts as
poverty and starvation (who ever heard of a woman of good family
starving in Virginia?), and, at last, if Gabriella were really in love
with Arthur, it would triumph over her finer judgment and reduce her to
submission. But while she watched him, in the very minute when, failing
for words, he caught her in his arms, she said to herself, suddenly
chilled and determined: "I must get it over to-night, and I've got to be
honest." The scent of the hyacinths floated to her again, but it seemed
to bring a cold wind, as if a draught had blown in through the closed
slats of the shutters.

"Everything has changed, Arthur," she said, "and I don't think I ought
to go on being engaged." Then because her words sounded insincere, she
added sternly: "Even if we could be married--and of course we can't
be--I--I don't feel that I should want to marry. I am not sure that I
love you enough to marry you."

It was all so unromantic, so unemotional, so utterly different from the
scene she had pictured when she imagined what "breaking her engagement"
would be like. Then she had always thought of herself as dissolving in
tears on the horsehair sofa, which had become sacred to the tragedy of
poor Jane; but, to her surprise, she did not feel now the faintest