stooped from the height which nature had given him, the result of his
fault had been such array of reasons and excuses that he did not now
know that he was in fault, but only had hateful suspicion of it when he
was brought to the pass of explaining himself to his lady-love. The
murmurs of an undecided conscience seldom take the form of definite
self-accusation. They did not now; and Trenholme's suspicion that he was
in the wrong only obtruded itself in the irritating perception that his
trouble had a ludicrous side. It would have been easier for him to have
gone to Sophia with confession of some family crime or tragedy than to
say to her, "My father was, my brother is, a butcher; and I have allowed
this fact to remain untold!" It was not that he did not intend to prove
to her that his silence on this subject was simply wise; he still
writhed under the knowledge that such confession, if it did not evoke
her loving sympathy, might evoke her merriment.

That afternoon, however, he made a resolution to speak to Sophia before
another twenty-four hours had passed--a resolution which was truly
natural in its inconsistency; for, after having waited for months to
hear Alec's purpose, he to-day decided to act without reference to him.
At the thought of the renewed solicitation of another lover, his own
love and manliness triumphed over everything else. He would tell her
fully and frankly all that had made him hesitate so long, and of his
long admiration for her, and how dearly he now loved her. He would not
urge her; he would, leave the choice to her. This resolution was not
made by any impulsive yielding to a storm of feeling, nor in the calm of
determined meditation; he simply made up his mind in the course of that
afternoon's occupation.