37/47 That necessity had never occurred to her; declaration of the love that had freed her seemed inevitable--nay, desirable. Her self-respect demanded it; only thus could she justify herself before his sisters and other people who knew her. _They_, perhaps, would not see it in the light of justification, but that mattered little; her own conscience would approve what she had done. But to steal away, and live henceforth in hiding, like a woman dishonoured even in her own eyes--from that she shrank with repugnance. Rather than that, would it not be preferable to break with her husband, and openly live apart from him, alone? |