"It _is_ a kindness to take a friendless and penniless orphan to your heart." Then she looked up at him, and reading in his clear pure eyes the story his lips had so lately uttered, she added with a smile, through the April mist of tears in her beautiful eyes: "Yes, it _is_ a kindness, let me take it as such; but not leave myself your debtor, for I will give you in return all my heart, and be henceforth to you tender and true." He seized her hands in rapture, and kissed them passionately. "We are in a church," he said; "let us seal our betrothal here, and pray for God's blessing." They were hidden from sight as they stood within the entrance of Prior Bird's Chantry Chapel, and there, hand clasped in hand, the young lovers knelt and silently prayed for God's blessing. As they rose, Griselda looked round, and a blast of chill air came over her from the opening of a side door. She shuddered, and said: "How cold it is!" "Yes; cold and damp. Let us hasten out into the sunshine." "Who opened that door?" she said. "Some old woman, I dare say, who comes to dust and clean," he answered, as they walked down the nave, surrounded, as it there was, with many tombs, and the walls crowded with tablets in memory of the dead. Lady Jane Waller's stately monument, and Bishop Montague's, were then, as now, conspicuous; and Griselda paused for a moment by the recumbent figure of the Lady Jane. As she did so, a figure, well known and dreaded, was seen coming from behind the monument. Griselda clasped Leslie Travers's arm with both hands, and said: "Let us hasten away--we are watched." But Leslie turned, and faced Sir Maxwell Danby. "The shadow of the church is a better trysting-place than the shelter of the dwellings in Crown Alley," he said, hissing the words out in what was hardly more than a whisper. Leslie was on the point of retorting angrily, when he controlled himself: "This is not the time and place," he said, "to demand an apology for your words, Sir Maxwell Danby. I will seek it elsewhere." But Griselda clung to his arm, and tried to advance towards the side door to get away from the man, who had dogged her steps. "Come--come, I pray you," she said; "do not stay." And Leslie Travers, saying in low but decided tones, "I will seek satisfaction elsewhere," let the door swing behind him, and he and Griselda passed out of the dim Abbey into the sunshine. It was still bright and beautiful without, and the fair city lay under the shadow of the encircling hills, which were touched with the glory of a brilliant winter's day. A slight fall of snow had defined the outline of church and houses, and the leafless trees were sparkling with ten thousand diamonds on their branches. The keen, crisp wind had dried the footways, and there was nothing on the smooth-paved roads to make walking anything but delightful. "I want to take you to my mother now," Leslie said. "Will you come?"