Wilkie Collins

“ If I told him what I am going to tell you, he would despise me. Own it plainly, Lucy, if I am asking too much in asking you to keep a secret from your husband."
"Nonsense, child! When you are married, you will know that the easiest of all secrets to keep is a secret from your husband. I give you my promise. Now begin!"
Clara hesitated painfully.
"I don't know how to begin!" she exclaimed, with a burst of despair. "The words won't come to me." ”

“ There is nobody here to listen to what we say. Open your heart, Clara. I see you are in trouble, and I want to comfort you."
Clara began to yield. In other words, she began to make conditions.
"Will you promise to keep what I tell you a secret from every living creature?" she began.
Mrs. Crayford met that question, by putting a question on her side.
"Does 'every living creature' include my husband?"
"Your husband more than anybody! I love him, I revere him. He is so noble; he is so good! ”

“ Is there anybody in whom you are interested coming home in the ship?"
"Somebody whom I am afraid of is coming home in the ship."
Mrs. Crayford's magnificent black eyes opened wide in amazement.
"My dear Clara! do you really mean what you say?"
"Wait a little, Lucy, and you shall judge for yourself. We must go back—if I am to make you understand me—to the year before we knew each other—to the last year of my father's life. Did I ever tell you that my father moved southward, for the sake of his health, to a house in Kent that was lent to him by a friend?" ”