"Little more remains to be added," pursued Matilda, as she fixed her dark eyes with a softened expression on those of Gerald, "since with the occurrences there you are already sufficiently acquainted. Yet there is one point upon which I would explain myself. When I first became your prisoner, my mind had been worked up to the highest pitch of determination, and in my captor I at first beheld but an evil genius who had interposed himself between me and my just revenge, when on the very eve of its consummation. Hence my petulance and impatience while in the presence of your noble General." "And whence that look, Matilda, that peculiar glance, which you bestowed upon me even within the same hour?" "Because in your frank and fearless mien I saw that manly honor and fidelity, the want of which had undone me." "Then if so, why the cold, the mortifying reserve, you manifested when we met at dinner at my uncle's table?" "Because I had also recollected that, degraded as I was, I ought not to seek the love of an honorable man, and that to win you to my interest would be of no avail, as, separated by the national quarrel, you could not by any possibility be near to aid me in my plans." "Then," said Gerald reproachfully, "it was merely to make me an instrument of vengeance that you sought me. Unkind Matilda!" "Nay, Gerald--recollect, that then I had not learnt to know you as I do now--I will not deny that when first I saw you, a secret instinct told me you were one whom I would have deeply loved had I never loved before; but betrayed and disappointed as I had been, I looked upon all men with a species of loathing--my kind, good, excellent more than father, excepted--and yet, Gerald, there were moments when I wished even him dead" (Gerald started)--"yes! dead--because I knew the anguish that would crush his heart, if he should ever learn that the false brand of the assassin had been affixed to the brow of his adopted child." Matilda sighed profoundly, and then resumed. "Later, however, when the absence of its object had in some degree abated the keenness of my thirst for revenge, and when more frequent intercourse had made me acquainted with the generous qualities of your mind, I loved you, Gerald, although I would not avow it, with a fervor I had never believed myself a second time capable of entertaining." Again the countenance of Matilda was radiant with the expression just alluded to by her lover. Gerald gazed at her as though his very being hung upon the continuance of that fascinating influence, and again he clasped her to his heart. "Matilda! oh, my own betrothed Matilda!" he murmured.