"Why this second condition?" I said, more for the purpose of gaining time than anything else. "What hath Mistress Nancy Molesworth to do with me?" "How do you know her name is Nancy?" he asked savagely. "I heard John Polperro name it. But what hath she to do with me?" "I would not have given you this opportunity," he went on, without heeding my question. "As soon as I knew you had climbed to the roof where she walks, I determined that you should be kept in safety until such time as--as----but it does not matter; Benet would not have it so. He suggested that you should have a chance of escape." I saw that Benet looked eagerly at me as though he would speak, but by an effort he restrained himself. "The maid is not in a convent school now," I said jibingly. "She is not to be a nun, I suppose. And I have taken no vow that I will not speak to a maid." "But you must not speak to her!" he cried, like one beside himself,--"not to her." "Why, pray?" "Because," he cried, evidently forgetting the relation in which I stood to him,--"because she is my betrothed wife! Because she belongs to me--only! Because no one but myself must lay hands on her!" "If she be your betrothed wife, she should love you," I said. "And if she loves you, perfect trust should exist between you." "But there be enemies! There be those who----" he hesitated, evidently realizing that he had said more than he had intended. "Will you promise?" he cried. "And if I do not?" I asked. "I told you there were dungeons here as well as battlements," he said. "If you will not give your sacred promise, you shall lie there until it is my pleasure to set you free!" "Tell me this, Otho Killigrew," I said, after thinking a moment. "You say you are betrothed to this maid. Does she willingly become your wife?" "That is naught to you!" In truth it was not; and for a moment I was in sore straits what to promise. I had no interest in the maid. She had paid me but scant courtesy that night, and why should I care whom she wedded? Moreover, if I refused to promise I was sure that Otho would carry out his threat. Even were I friendly disposed towards her and John Polperro, I could do them no good by refusing to abide by Otho Killigrew's conditions. Then I remembered the look of loathing on the maid's face as she spoke of the Killigrews, and instinctively I felt that such a marriage would be worse than death to her. I am anything but a sentimental man, neither do I give way to foolish fancy; but at that moment I saw the maid pleading with me not to promise. "No, I will not accept your last condition," I said. The words escaped me almost without the consent of my own will, for I felt I dared not sneak out of the house in such a way. After all, I was a Trevanion, and came of an honourable race. My fathers had fought many battles for women in the past. Perhaps some of their spirit came to me as I spoke. "You will not!" he cried like one amazed.