That voice of deep-souled womanhood had remained within him as the
enkindling conceptions of dead and sceptred genius had remained within
him (is there not a genius for feeling nobly which also reigns over
human spirits and their conclusions?); the tones were a music from
which he was falling away--he had really fallen into a momentary doze,
when Rosamond said in her silvery neutral way, "Here is your tea,
Tertius," setting it on the small table by his side, and then moved
back to her place without looking at him. Lydgate was too hasty in
attributing insensibility to her; after her own fashion, she was
sensitive enough, and took lasting impressions. Her impression now was
one of offence and repulsion. But then, Rosamond had no scowls and had
never raised her voice: she was quite sure that no one could justly
find fault with her.
Perhaps Lydgate and she had never felt so far off each other before;
but there were strong reasons for not deferring his revelation, even if
he had not already begun it by that abrupt announcement; indeed some of
the angry desire to rouse her into more sensibility on his account
which had prompted him to speak prematurely, still mingled with his
pain in the prospect of her pain. But he waited till the tray was
gone, the candles were lit, and the evening quiet might be counted on:
the interval had left time for repelled tenderness to return into the
old course. He spoke kindly.
"Dear Rosy, lay down your work and come to sit by me," he said, gently,
pushing away the table, and stretching out his arm to draw a chair near
his own.
Rosamond obeyed. As she came towards him in her drapery of transparent
faintly tinted muslin, her slim yet round figure never looked more
graceful; as she sat down by him and laid one hand on the elbow of his
chair, at last looking at him and meeting his eyes, her delicate neck
and cheek and purely cut lips never had more of that untarnished beauty
which touches as in spring-time and infancy and all sweet freshness.
It touched Lydgate now, and mingled the early moments of his love for
her with all the other memories which were stirred in this crisis of
deep trouble. He laid his ample hand softly on hers, saying--
"Dear!" with the lingering utterance which affection gives to the word.
Rosamond too was still under the power of that same past, and her
husband was still in part the Lydgate whose approval had stirred
delight. She put his hair lightly away from his forehead, then laid
her other hand on his, and was conscious of forgiving him.