'My darling--my lost darling!' broke from his lips, as he clasped her in his arms, and her slender fingers softly and tremulously caressed his dark and closely-curling hair with something that was almost motherly, or sisterly, in the intensity of its tenderness. 'Oh, Evan,' she whispered, 'may God watch over you, spare you, protect you, and give you some other heart to make you happy.' It was some solace to Evan's wounded spirit that she had been in a manner--apart from her temporary doubt of himself--forced into her marriage; that her own free will, poor girl, had no hand in the matter. Clasped to his heart, hers was beating for some moments 'with the wild music of recovered joy, her great dread silenced by her greater passion.' But to what end was it all? 'This is madness!' exclaimed Evan, as they stood for a minute, hand clasped in hand, and gazing into each other's eyes. 'Madness indeed!' moaned Eveline. 'I am going far away, my darling, and shall never see you again. That I may find a grave in Egypt is the kindest wish you can have for me; and that you will never think but kindly of me in the time to come, is my only and my dearest hope now.' She was in his arms again--the girl, every tress of whose brown-golden hair was dear to him--every expression of whose eyes and lips, every tone of whose voice, every charm and grace of whose face and form were graven on his inner heart; but what availed all that now? 'You know all now--my secret, and that I was not false to you, Eveline?' said he. 'All,' she replied, hollowly. 'Poor Alice could not come to my quarters in the Castle, consequently I had to meet her somewhere--where you saw us. Poor little soul, she had no one to trust, to--to confide in, save me.' 'And now----' 'She has gone back to her husband--back to my brother in India.' 'Desperate with the idea that you, Evan, had deceived me, I was blind--careless--passive in their hands, and heedless what became of me; and Sir Paget bought me of them--bought me of papa and mamma--as a slave who loathes her buyers and her slavery!' exclaimed Eveline, wildly. 'Such a fate, my darling!' 'Such a fate, indeed!' she whispered through her set teeth. 'But we must part now,' she added, but without withdrawing her hands from his firm clasp. 'A parting bitter as death, Eveline.' 'And as hopeless,' she said, now sobbing heavily. 'Yet, with all its bitterness, this has been a great, an unexpected joy to see you here, to embrace you once again.' Of one grim fact they could not be oblivious. She was another man's wife, and he had to tear himself away; to lose for ever the sight of that sweet, afflicted face, the tones of that beloved voice, to long again for both, with eager eyes and ears, in the time that was to come. 'Though parted thus, Eveline, you will think of me sometimes--you will remember?' 'For ever and for ever, while my miserable life lasts, Evan.'