Lucy had a great idea of duty; hers was no high-principled love of duty from the noblest motives, but a morbid dread of self-reproach. She had not _character_ enough to do anything out of her own notions of the beaten track. She had promised her father she would marry Sir Hugh Horsingham--not that he had the slightest right to exact such a promise--and she felt bound to fulfil it. She never remembered the injury she was doing "Cousin Edward," the _right_ which such devotion as _his_ ought to have given him. She _knew_ she loved him better than any one in the world; she knew she was about to commit an act of the greatest injustice towards Sir Hugh; but she had "promised papa," and though she would have given worlds to avoid fulfilling her compact, she had not strength of mind to break the chain and be free. Cousin Edward! Cousin Edward! you should have carried her off then and there; she would have been truly grateful for the rest of her life, but she would have died sooner than open her lips. He was hurt--reckless--almost savage. He thought her sullen. "Once more, Lucy," he said, and his eye glared fiercely in the waning light--"once more, _will_ you give me one word, or _never_ set eyes on me again?" Her lip never moved. "I give you till we pass that tree"--he looked dangerous now--"and then"--he swore a great oath--"I leave you for ever!" Lucy thought the tree looked strange and ghastly in the rising moon, she even remarked a knot upon its smooth white stem; but she held out whilst one might have counted ten; and when she turned round, poor girl, Cousin Edward was gone! CHAPTER IX. So the bells rung merrily at Dangerfield, and the rustics huzzaed for their landlord and the comely village maidens envied the bride; and Lucy was Lady Horsingham now, with new duties and a high position, and a large, fine, gloomy house, and jewels in her hair, and an aching heart in her bosom. Nevertheless, she determined to do her duty as a wife; and every hour of the day she resolved _not_ to think of Cousin Edward. Years elapsed, and pretty Lucy became a gentle, handsome woman--kindly, courteous, and beloved by all, timid, and shrinking only with Sir Hugh. Her husband, wearied and discontented, mixed himself fiercely in all the intrigues of the day--became a staunch partisan of the House of Stuart, and sought for excitement abroad in proportion as he missed congeniality of feeling at home. It was an unhappy household. Their one child was the mother's sole consolation; she scarcely ever let it out of her presence. They were a pretty sight, that loving couple, as they basked in the sun of a fine summer's morning on the terrace in front of the manor-house. The boy, with his mother's blue eyes and his own golden curls and the arch, merry smile that he never got from stern Sir Hugh; and the fair, graceful woman, with her low, white brow and her soft brown hair and her quiet gestures and gentle sorrowing face--that face that haunts poor Cousin Edward still.