George Eliot: Silas Marner

PART TWO 18. CHAPTER XVIII (continued)

"Nancy," said Godfrey, slowly, "when I married you, I hid something from you--something I ought to have told you. That woman Marner found dead in the snow--Eppie's mother--that wretched woman--was my wife: Eppie is my child."

He paused, dreading the effect of his confession. But Nancy sat quite still, only that her eyes dropped and ceased to meet his. She was pale and quiet as a meditative statue, clasping her hands on her lap.

"You'll never think the same of me again," said Godfrey, after a little while, with some tremor in his voice.

She was silent.

"I oughtn't to have left the child unowned: I oughtn't to have kept it from you. But I couldn't bear to give you up, Nancy. I was led away into marrying her--I suffered for it."

Still Nancy was silent, looking down; and he almost expected that she would presently get up and say she would go to her father's. How could she have any mercy for faults that must seem so black to her, with her simple, severe notions?

But at last she lifted up her eyes to his again and spoke. There was no indignation in her voice--only deep regret.

"Godfrey, if you had but told me this six years ago, we could have done some of our duty by the child. Do you think I'd have refused to take her in, if I'd known she was yours?"

At that moment Godfrey felt all the bitterness of an error that was not simply futile, but had defeated its own end. He had not measured this wife with whom he had lived so long. But she spoke again, with more agitation.

"And--Oh, Godfrey--if we'd had her from the first, if you'd taken to her as you ought, she'd have loved me for her mother--and you'd have been happier with me: I could better have bore my little baby dying, and our life might have been more like what we used to think it 'ud be."