I told your brother I had meant to fascinate him and that
I was not in love with him, but I let him think that perhaps I meant
to marry him. I think I did mean to marry him. I had never cared
for anybody, and I thought it might be there really WASN'T anything
more than a kind of excited fondness. I can't be sure, but I think
that though I did mean to marry him I never should have done it,
because that sort of a marriage is--it's sacrilege--something would
have stopped me. Something did stop me; it was your sister-in-law,
Sibyl. She meant no harm--but she was horrible, and she put what
I was doing into such horrible words--and they were the truth--oh!
I SAW myself! She was proposing a miserable compact with me--and
I couldn't breathe the air of the same room with her, though I'd so
cheapened myself she had a right to assume that I WOULD. But I
couldn't! I left her, and I wrote to your brother--just a quick
scrawl. I told him just what I'd done; I asked his pardon, and
I said I would not marry him. I posted the letter, but he never
got it. That was the afternoon he was killed. That's all, Bibbs.
Now you know what I did--and you know--ME!" She pressed her
clenched hands tightly against her eyes, leaning far forward, her
head bowed before him.
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