“Alas, alas! to think with what terror I heard him sing it the last time. He may not be more changed within, perhaps, than he is without; since, notwithstanding what he said about his looks, I knew him again the first moment my eye lit upon him on yonder lawn. I wonder whether he would have known _me_, supposing he had snatched away my veil. Merciful Heaven, what a risk was that! nay, is not every moment that he remains at Mirk a risk! What if he heard the name of Gavestone coupled with mine? I am sure he recognised something in my voice, although I disguised it all I could. He must never come back hither--never, never! He must be as dead to me now as I deemed him to be before. God knows I pity him from the bottom of my heart: and also”--here she paused--“yes, and also that I do not love him--no, not him, although I love the man that wrote these words. I never concealed it, no, never, from my--Sir Robert himself. I said: 'I have no love to give you,' all along; 'only respect, devotion, duty.' And those, Heaven knows, I gave. If all together, and a hundred other gracious feelings added, could have made up love, then Sir Robert would have had that; but they can _not_. He knew it, noble heart, and was content. He knew that in that drawer I kept these very things that came on shore with me when----O Ralph, Ralph, Ralph!” My Lady shook with sobs; and then, in her agony, mistaking the noise of her own passion for some interruption from without, started up from the desk on which she had thrown herself, and listened.