Child! child!" he cried, "I am, and ever was, a coward, too
timid to face life without reserve, and always I laughed because I was
afraid to concede that anything is serious!"
For a long while Richard lay at his ease in the lengthening shadows of
the afternoon.
"I love her. She thinks me an elderly imbecile with a flat and reedy
singing-voice, and she is perfectly right. She has never even
entertained the notion of loving me. That is well, for to-morrow, or,
it may be, the day after, we must part forever. I would not have the
parting make her sorrowful--or not, at least, too unalterably
sorrowful. It is very well that Branwen does not love me.
"Why should she? I am almost twice her age, an aging fellow now,
battered and selfish and too indolent to love her--say, as Gwyllem
loved her. I did well to kill that Gwyllem. I am profoundly glad I
killed him, and I thoroughly enjoyed doing it; but, after all, the man
loved her in his fashion, and to the uttermost reach of his gross
nature. I love her in a rather more decorous and acceptable fashion,
it is true, but only a half of me loves her.
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