My blindness helped me. With your face and your eyes in view I should
have believed without question just what you wished me to believe. But
you had no longer those defences. I on my side had grown quicker. I
began in a word to see. For the first time in my life I began to see."
Mrs. Adair did not move. Durrance, upon his side, appeared to expect no
answer or acknowledgment. He spoke with the voice of enjoyment which a
man uses recounting difficulties which have ceased to hamper him,
perplexities which have been long since unravelled.
"I should have definitely broken off our engagement, I suppose, at once.
For I still believed, and as firmly as ever, that there must be more
than friendship on both sides. But I had grown selfish. I warned you,
Ethne, selfishness was the blind man's particular fault. I waited and
deferred the time of marriage. I made excuses. I led you to believe that
there was a chance of recovery when I knew there was none. For I hoped,
as a man will, that with time your friendship might grow into more than
friendship. So long as there was a chance of that, I--Ethne, I could not
let you go. So, I listened for some new softness in your voice, some new
buoyancy in your laughter, some new deep thrill of the heart in the
music which you played, longing for it--how much! Well, to-night I have
burnt my boats.
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