Thus humbly I thought of her in my full, young heart, that was breaking with love and longing. And I did it in the most assured conviction, in the firmest faith, of the nobility and purity of her I loved so dearly. I can truly say there was no drop of blood in my veins that did not belong to her. I would have given my life for her had she asked it of me, had she taken me for the true heart that I was, had she dealt honestly with me. Was it a presentiment of the brief space of time that I was still to cherish the simple faith that there is a spark of virtue in every human breast that nothing can entirely extinguish, that made me now bow my head upon my hands and shed hot tears? I suddenly lifted my head, for I fancied I heard a rustling close behind me, and I was not mistaken. It was Constance, who came through the bushes hedging the path to the beech-wood. I sprang suddenly in confusion to my feet, and stood before her, ere I had time to wipe the traces of my tears from my cheeks. "My good George," she said, offering me her hand with a gentle smile, "you are my true friend, are you not?" I murmured some indistinct reply. "Let me sit here by you a little while," she said; "I feel somewhat tired; I have been up so long. Do you know where I have been? In the forest by the tarn, and afterwards up at the ruin. Do you know that we have never again gone there together? I was thinking of it this morning, and was sorry; it is so beautiful up on the cliffs, and walking with you is so pleasant. Why do you never come there to bring me home? Don't you remember what you promised me: to be my faithful George, and kill all the dragons in my path? How many have you killed?" She glanced at me from under her long lashes with her unfathomable brown eyes, and abashed I looked upon the ground. "Why do you not answer?" she asked. "Has my father forbidden you?" "No," I replied, "but I do not know whether you are not mocking me. You have shown me lately so little kindness, that at last I have hardly dared to speak to you or even to look at you." "And you really do not know why I have lately been less friendly towards you?" "No," I answered, and added softly, "unless it be because I am so much attached to your father; and how can I be otherwise?" Her looks darkened, "And if that were the reason," she said, "could you blame me? My father does not love me; he has given me too many proofs of that. How can any one love me who is 'so much attached to my father?'"--she spoke the last words with bitterness--"who perhaps reports to him every word that I say, and to the watchers and tale-bearers by whom I am surrounded adds another, so much the more dangerous as I should have expected from him anything but treachery." "Treachery--treachery from me?" I exclaimed with horror.