"Yes," said Norah, with a frank but still
perplexed expression, saying to herself; "what
can he mean?"

"Have I deceived myself?" he then began;
"have I read your heart only by the light of
my own? But, no! it cannot all be only
the reflection of myself! You do feel for me
kindly, affectionately, with sympathy—is it
not so, Miss Lyndon? You do!"

He spoke earnestly, but O! so gently—his
soft voice falling like music on the air, his
manner so controlled, so respectful!

"Yes," said Norah, looking frightened, "I
do feel all this for you."

"No more? Must I be content only with
friendship? O, Norah! I can keep my
secret no longer. Promised though you are
to another—but promised to one you do not
love, and with whom you are unhappy and
ill-assorted—it is no dishonour to seek to free
you. If you can gain sufficient strength to
break off your present engagement, Miss
Lyndon, the whole study of my life will be
how best to make you happy; how best to
shape my life to yours."

He took her hand: it was cold and trembled.

"I am sorry you have said all this,"
Norah answered in a low voice, "for now I
have lost my companion. I do not love you,
Mr. Thorold, and I did not know that you
loved me. You were a prized companion—the
first I have ever had—and I liked you
and felt grateful to you; but, indeed, indeed,
I do not love you."

Edmund made no complaint. He only
shivered, and turned paler than Norah
herself, his forehead and upper lip standing
thick with heavy drops.

"Then you love your cousin, who is expected
back so soon—perhaps this very day—to
claim you?"

Norah was silent.

"I did not know that," continued Edmund;
"I did not believe you loved him."

Still she did not speak; she only shuddered
slightly and looked down.

"But you forgive me for my presumption?"
said the poor youth grievingly, doing his best
to prolong the conversation—the last he
might ever have with her alone, or on that
dangerously dear topic.

"Forgive you?—yes!—but it is not
presumption. I have been to blame for not
having understood your feelings better.
Forgive you? Indeed, yes! but there is no
forgiveness needed!"

She spoke fast for her, and almost with
warmth.

He raised her hand to his lips, without
any show of passion, in a quiet subdued
manner only, then left her—very sadly, but
patiently and calmly—Norah looking after
him sadly, too—feeling as if she should never
see that young slight form again.

She was still looking after him when
Gregory stood before her. Livid, haggard,
worn, with a light in his eyes as in those of
a panther about to spring, he stood before
Norah like an evil spirit. Norah screamed,
and started to her feet. Then, summoning
all her self-possession, she sat down again,
slowly stiffening into the statue-like, passive,
painful immobility which was all that Gregory
knew of her.

"I have heard your conversation," said
Gregory, bitterly.  "Is this the way you
keep your vow, Norah? Answer me at
once, and without subterfuge, is this what
you call faithfulness?"

"I have broken no vow," said Norah.

"No? Then perhaps my ears have
deceived me; perhaps I have heard nothing;
perhaps it is a dream—a fancy—and young
Edmund Thorold has made you no offer of
his love. Am I mad, Norah? Am I dreaming?
Have I my actual senses, and yet you
dare tell me to my face that you have kept
your faith with me?"

"If you have heard all, cousin, you will
know that I have done so."

"Proof of which, I find my rival pouring
out words of love to you! That looks like
woman's faith, surely. O Norah, Norah!"
he cried, dropping this bitter satire of his
manner for the wild love natural to him, "is
it not maddening for any man to have the
thing he loves profaned by the love of
another? Is it not torture, think you, on
returning home to claim the treasure of one's
life, to find a rude hand laid on the casket,
and one's very title disputed? Norah, what
did I hear when my eager blood had flown to
my heart for joy to find myself so near you,
—what did I hear? A boy telling you that
you did not love me, and you suffering the lie
to go forth uncontradicted! Not love me—not!
love me! Ay, before God and man, you
do! I have come for you, Norah; I have
come to bid you fly with me to-night; to
leave all, and follow me, as you swore you
would do; to be mine—indissolubly mine—before
heaven and the world; never more to
be taken from me—never more to be separated.
Norah, Norah! I call on you now to
fulfil your promise, and to come!"

"To-night, cousin? Secretly! Without
my father's knowledge? No, no!" said
Norah, terrified.

He seized her in his arms.

Despair and terror nerved Norah. "No,
cousin, no," she said, "I cannot do this without
my father's consent."

"Then that lad spoke true. You do not
love me," groaned Gregory. "O! what
prevents my killing you now, as you lie back
upon my arm? What better death for
both?" he muttered, passing his hand inside
his vest, and laying it on the handle of a
dagger always worn there.

"You may kill me if you will, cousin," said
Norah, her terror lending her the semblance
of courage.

"Kill you! Not a hair of that golden
head should come to harm by me!" cried