"And did not all these sad events, Mary," and his voice was low and trembling as he looked down upon the cowering woman, "soften your heart to pity, not revenge? Our affections are not our own; we are not masters of these but by many a hard struggle. I never could have loved you more than as a sister: it was not pride, Mary; we have none of that with those we love. I loved you very truly for your own sake, for the sake of our happy days of childhood together, and for my mother's sake." As the last words fell from him, the man, for a moment spirit-broken and agonized, sunk down on a chair, and, leaning his head on his arm across the table, wept like any woman over the ruin before him, and his memory of another. He had not one selfish thought; he was iron for himself,--for others, as a child at heart in love and gentleness. She rose, and, creeping to his side, took the hand which, clenched in its agony, rested on his knee, and, dropping on hers, she covered it with tears and kisses. "Forgive me, Miles," she sobbed, "for you know not all I endured of trial before I fell. He told me you had scoffed at my love--to him. It was not the work of a day or hour; it is nearly eight long years since you quitted this place; for more than four we have not met; for less than that space I have been the guilty creature I now am!" Insensibly his hand unclenched and clasped her's; she continued sobbing between each scarcely-articulate word, "When, by every artifice man could employ, he led me to error; and, ever since, this most bitter repentance. 'Twas done under the promise of making me his wife, to show _you_ that _he_ appreciated my worth. And when he said you not only had repulsed my love, but scorned it----" "He lied, Mary, he lied!" articulated the sorrowing man, looking up; "from _me_ he never heard of our love; he must have divined it." "God help me!" she uttered, kissing his clasping hand, "for I have suffered much; and it was my refusal (for years now) to continue in my error, which has made him persecute me so of late. I told him last time we met, that _I loved you still, and ever should_." These last words were scarcely breathed. "Heaven help you, my poor girl!" cried Miles, looking at her as he placed a hand gently on her head; "for what can that love bring you?--Sorrow and disheartenment in every effort for existence; a log to hamper every step of your pathway to independence! Rise up, Mary," and he drew her on his heart; "come what may, my girl, these arms will shelter you still from the cold, heartless world. I am richer now, Mary, and to-morrow you and that poor old woman shall leave this place; and once away, oh, then!----" He spoke the last words with a stern resolution. "What, Miles?" and she clasped his clenched hand in her's, and gazed terrified in his flashing eyes. "I'll return to my home abroad," he uttered, dropping them to conceal _their_ speech, lest she should read aright. CHAPTER VI.