“But I hope you don’t regret having been brought here,” she said softly, looking up at him. It was a cruel speech, and the look and the tone were more cruel still. If she had meant to bring him to her feet, she could not have done any thing better adapted to her purpose, and she did not mean to bring him to her feet. She did it only out of a little personal feeling and a little sympathy, and the perversity of her heart. Powys started violently, and gave her a look under which Sara, courageous as she was, actually trembled; and the next thing he did was to turn his back upon her, and look long and intently at the nearest picture. It was not the Claude this time. It was a picture of a woman holding out a piece of bread to a beggar at her door. The wretch, in his misery, was crouching by the wall and holding out his hand for it, and within were the rosy children, well-fed and comfortable, looking large-eyed upon the want without. The young man thought it was symbolical, as he stood looking at it, quivering all over with emotion which he was laboring to shut up in his own breast. She was holding out the bread of life to him, but it would never reach his lips. He stood struggling to command himself, forgetting every thing but the desperation of that struggle, betraying himself more than any words could have done--fighting his fight of honor and truth against temptation. Sara saw all this, and the little temptress was not satisfied. It would be difficult to tell what impulse possessed her. She had driven him very far, but not yet to the farthest point; and she could not give up her experiment at its very height. “But you do not answer my question,” she said, very softly. The words were scarcely out of her lips, the tingle of compunction had not begun in her heart, when her victim’s strength gave way. He turned round upon her with a wild breathlessness that struck Sara dumb. She had seen more than one man who supposed he was “in love” with her; but she had never seen passion before. “I would regret it,” he said, “if I had any sense or spirit left; but I have not, and I don’t regret. Take it all--take it!--and then scorn it. I know you will. What could you do but scorn it? It is only my heart and my life; and I am young and shall have to live on hundreds of years, and never see your sweetest face again.” “Mr. Powys!” said Sara in consternation, turning very pale. “Yes,” he said, melting out of the momentary swell of excitement, “I think I am mad to say so. I don’t grudge it. It is no better than a flower that you will put your foot on; and now that I have told you, I know it is all over. But I don’t grudge it. It was not your doing; and I would rather give it to you to be flung away than to any other woman. Don’t be angry with me--I shall never see you again.”