A Bankrupt Heart, Volume III by Florence Marryat

As the Countess of Ilfracombe returned to the Hall, with her packet of letters in her hand, her heart was very glad, but at the same time it was filled with soberer thoughts than it had indulged in for some time past. What was after all the great difference between her and Nell Llewellyn? She had not fallen, it was true -- she had not openly disgraced herself -- but what had her flirtation with Jack Portland been if not a lowering of her womanly dignity; a soiling of her purity; a smirching of the delicate bloom and whiteness that should have protected her maidenly life as with a veil? Nora felt terribly ashamed of herself as she remembered it. Her great fear had passed away, thanks to Nell's interest and intrepidity, and her mind had time to think of other things. This poor despised girl had saved her from all sorts of horrors; preserved her husband's faith in her; his love for her; had placed in her hand, as it were, the whole happiness of her life.

But she herself -- if she destroyed these letters, as she fully intended to do, how would she be any better than before -- any more deserving of Ilfracombe's affection and confidence? She would be safe, it is true, but safety did not constitute worthiness. And Nora had begun to long to _deserve_ her husband's love -- to be able to accept it with an unburdened conscience -- feeling that there was nothing between them, not even a shadow cast from the past. Could she, she asked herself, as she wended homewards, ever summon up the courage to tell him everything, to make him the arbiter of her destiny, to constitute him her judge and await the sentence he chose to pronounce upon her? It would be very awful she thought, terrible beyond description; she did not think she could possibly undergo such an ordeal. She pictured to herself Ilfracombe's stern face as he listened to the unfolding of a tale so dissonant to his own feelings, so unlike all he had conceived of her, so dreadful to hear of the woman of whom he thought so highly, who he had chosen for his wife before all others. Nora shuddered when she thought thus, and told herself that it could not be. She valued his good opinion and his affection too highly. But there was another side of the question.