I tell you frankly how it is with me.

I would as soon press a pistol to my forehead and pull the trigger as have this boy go back into the world and tell his story.
For you, too, it would be ruin." Cecil sank back into his chair, and looked with wide-open but unseeing eyes across the table, through the wall beyond.

He saw his future damned by that one unpardonable accusation.

He saw himself sent out into the world penniless, an outcast from all the things in life which made existence tolerable.

He knew very well that Andrew would never forgive.