'The stipulated two years are still far from a close,' said Laura coldly; 'and, till they are ended, our intercourse cannot be too slight.' 'Surely,' cried Hargrave, 'when you fixed this lingering probation, you did not mean to banish me from your presence for two years!' Laura could not with truth aver that such a banishment had been her intention. 'I believe,' said she, suppressing a sigh, 'that would have been my wisest meaning.' 'I would sooner die,' cried Hargrave, vehemently. 'Oh, had I sooner found you,' added he, a dark expression which Laura could not define clouding his countenance, 'what wretchedness would have been spared! But now that we have at last met,' continued he, his eyes again sparkling with love and hope, 'I will haunt you, cling to you, supplicate you, till I melt you to a passion as fervent as my own,' While he spoke he dropped upon his knee by her side, and drew his arm passionately round her. Time had been, that Laura, trembling with irrepressible emotion, would have withdrawn from the embrace, reproaching herself for sensations from which she imagined that the more spotless heart of her lover was free, and hating herself for being unable to receive as a sister, the caresses of a fondness pure as a brother's love. But Hargrave had himself torn the veil from her eyes; and shrinking from him as if a serpent had crossed her path, she cast on him a look that struck like an ice-bolt on the glowing heart of Hargrave. 'Just Heaven!' he cried, starting up with a convulsive shudder, 'this is abhorrence! Why, why have you deceived me with a false show of sensibility? Speak it at once,' said he, wildly grasping her arm; 'say that you detest me, and tell me too who has dared to supplant me in a heart once wholly mine.' 'Be calm, I implore you,' said Laura, terrified at his violence, 'no one has supplanted you. I am, I ever shall be, whatever you deserve to find me.' Laura's soothing voice, her insinuating look, retained all their wonted power to calm the fierce passions of her lover. 'Oh I shall never deserve you,' said he in a tone of wretchedness, while his face was again crossed by an expression of anguish, which the unsuspecting Laura attributed to remorse for his former treatment of herself.