At last she was driven to speak out.

"Captain Aylmer," she said, "the subject is so distasteful to me, that I must ask you not to speak about it." "In my position I am driven to think about it." "I cannot, of course, help your thoughts; but I can assure you that they are unnecessary." "It seems to me so hard that there should be such a gulf between you and me." This he said after he had been silent for a while; and as he spoke he looked away from her at the fire.
"I don't know that there is any particular gulf," she replied.
"Yes, there is.

And it is you that make it.

Whenever I attempt to speak to you as a friend you draw yourself off from me, and shut yourself up.

I know that it is not jealousy." "Jealousy, Captain Aylmer!" "Jealousy with my aunt, I mean." "No, indeed." "You are infinitely too proud for that; but I am sure that a stranger seeing it all would think that it was so." "I don't know what it is that I do or that I ought not to do.