The Cavalier looked as if he understood her not, or thought her senses wandered: at last he said, "But why need you, with a fortune to command, and a spirit to enjoy whatever is bright, or beautiful, or glorious--why should you fetter your free-born will? There is a cunning mystery about it, Constance" (Constance shuddered, and hid her face, lest its expression should betray something of her secret); "a mystery I cannot solve: confide it to me, and solemnly I swear, not only never to divulge, but to peril, with my good sword, my heart's richest and warmest blood, in any cause that can free you from this bad man. Nor do I expect aught of you in return, nor any thing ask, save that you may be happy, with any, any but this---- I cannot speak his hated name." Constance was too agitated to reply. Under present circumstances, she would have given worlds not to have seen Walter; and, having seen him, she knew not what to say, or how to think or act: the painful struggle she endured deprived her of the power of utterance. "It is not for myself I speak, Constantia; though now I need not tell you that the love of boyhood has never been banished from my bosom. The remembrance of the hours we spent together, before a knowledge of the world, before a change in the constitution of our country, shed its malign influence, not over our hearts, but over our destinies--the remembrance of those hours has been the blessing, the solitary blessing, of my exile; it has been the green oasis in the desert of my existence: amid the turmoil of battle, it has led me on to victory; amid the dissipation of the royal court, it has preserved me from taint. The remembrance of Constance, like the night-star that cheers the mariner on the wide sea, has kept all holy and hopeful feelings around my heart; telling of home, my early home, and its enjoyments--of Constance, the little affectionate, but high-souled girl--the----" "Stop!" interrupted Constance, with an agonised expression--"Stop, I conjure you! I know what you were going to say; you were about to repeat that which my mother loved to call me--your wife! She did not mean it in mockery, though it sounds so now, like a knell from the lower earth. But one thing, Walter, one request I have to make--you pray sometimes?--the time has been when we have prayed together!--when _next_ you pray, thank God that SHE is dead!" "How! thank God that my kind and early friend--that your mother is dead!" repeated the young man, in a voice of astonishment. "Even so, Walter. You would not see her stretched upon the rack? would not see her exposed to tortures, such as, at no very distant period, the saints of our own church endured?--would not see her torn limb from limb by wild horses?" "Heavens! Constantia, are you mad?" exclaimed Walter, terrified at her excited and distraught manner.