Nor could he
bring himself to approach Clara. It was often in his mind to write
to her; had he obeyed the voice of his desire he would have penned
such letters as only the self-abasement of a passionate lover can
dictate. But herein, too, the strain of sternness that marked his
character made its influence felt. He said to himself that the only
hope of Clara's respecting him lay in his preservation of the
attitude he had adopted, and as the months went on he found a bitter
satisfaction in adhering so firmly to his purpose. The self-flattery
with which no man can dispense whispered assurance that Clara only
thought the more of him the longer he held aloof. When the end of
July came, he definitely prescribed to his patience a trial of yet
one more month. Then he would write Clara a long letter, telling her
what it had cost him to keep silence, and declaring the constancy he
devoted to her.
This resolve he registered whilst at work one morning. The
triumphant sunshine, refusing to be excluded even from London
workshops, gleamed upon his tools and on the scraps of jewellery
before him; he looked up to the blue sky, and thought with heavy
heart of many a lane in Surrey and in Essex where he might be
wandering but for this ceaseless necessity of earning the week's
wage.
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