He paused, for his throat swelled, and there was a gush of water in his eyes that made the lighted window upon which they rested dim and indistinct. “What now shall be my future course?” he continued with deep emotion; “my ambition is strangled in its birth. Fame! what have I to do with fame? sought only that my hour of triumph should be rewarded by her sweet smile of joy. What to me the rank in which high success would place me, if her eyes, glowing with gratified pride at sight of the honours I had won, were lost to me? No; life hath no more a motive to render it worth its endurance. A rifle and the prairies of the Far West shall be my world; there at least in the vast solitudes I can, uninterrupted, dwell upon her memory, revel in glorious visions of her angel face”---- A hand placed lightly upon his shoulder interrupted his soliloquy. He turned sharply to find at his side Colonel Mires. “A word with you,” he said to Hal, abruptly. “Follow me.” “No!” returned Hal, coldly. “What _you_ can have to say to me can as well be said here as elsewhere. We are unobserved.” “In sight of that window it is, perhaps, as well,” returned the Colonel. There was a pause for a moment; Hal made no remark upon the insinuation thus conveyed, and the Colonel proceeded---- “With you I ought to have no difficulty in coming to the point,” he said. With one in a different position my task would not be so easy, therefore I at once say I perceive that you with ignorant audacity”---- “Sir,” cried Hal, fiercely. “Hear me out”---- “Not another word, if such expressions are to be addressed to me. I will submit to insult from no man breathing; he who attempts it had need beware of a strong arm, and a spirit which never yet bent or quailed before a danger.” “It is not my design to insult you. I gain no end by it; if I use plain terms, attribute it to my desire to describe exactly the act of one of mean birth aspiring to ally himself to a house with a pedigree extending to the Norman Conquest”---- “Colonel Mires, as few words, if you please, between us as possible; briefly state the object of your seeking this interview with me. My answer shall be clear, decided, and prompt as short.” “Be it so. An accident has enabled you to render a service to Miss Wilton. The firemen of London nightly do the same thing to hundreds, and are content with the fee they receive as their reward. You, on the contrary, with, as I have said, ig”---- “I warn you to be choice in your terms!” “You actually, on account of the common deed you performed, have inflated yourself with a monstrous notion that you might aspire to the hand of a young lady of birth and wealth. You have, perhaps, been led to nurse this ridiculous conception, because Miss Wilton, with the true and refined courtesy of a well-bred lady, has extended towards you a kindness of manner she would have displayed to the very fireman you forestalled, if he had been the person who rescued her from the peril she was in.”