Thus giving utterance to broken and disjointed sentences, in a tone often of despair and grief, her small delicate hands clasped together, she continued at the window for some minutes. Again she was silent, when what sounded more like an hysterical laugh than one of joy broke from her lips. "It were destruction to turn back now," she cried; "and, my young lord marquis, I am your most humble bride. Begone, from henceforth, all vain foolish fears and regrets, which gaiety will easily dissipate." She turned quickly round with a smiling countenance, for she heard a footstep approaching, thinking it was one of her female attendants; but she started suddenly at seeing, instead, the tall figure of a young and handsome cavalier, advancing rapidly towards her with the intention, it appeared by his gestures, of saluting her on the cheek without waiting for permission, had she not drawn back with an expression of anger in her countenance, and, throwing herself into a chair, coldly held out her hand. The movement had the effect, as by magic, of arresting the young man in his headlong career. He gazed at her for some time, without uttering a syllable, with a steady, mournful, and surprised look. "Can it be possible that I am so changed, during an absence but of two years, that you know me not?" he at length exclaimed. "I cannot, dare not, believe that Donna Theresa would thus cruelly have behaved, had she known me." "Oh, I know you perfectly, my good cousin," answered the young lady; "nor do I perceive that you are in the slightest degree changed from the boisterous, forward youth you were when you set out on your travels, if I may judge by the unceremonious way in which you forced yourself into my private apartments." The young cavalier gazed at her with amazement, while a look of pain, or we may say rather of agony, crossed his handsome features. "Do I hear aright," he exclaimed passionately, "or am I in some horrid dream? Yet methought all was reality till I entered here; but now I cannot, dare not believe my senses." "You appear to me to be perfectly awake, Don Luis; nor do I wish you on any account to believe otherwise. Look round this room; the tapestry, the hangings, the furniture are the same; nor am I very much altered in appearance since the time you quitted Portugal. Your own extravagant expectations are alone not realised." She spoke in a tone half of banter and half serious,--"Come, come, my good cousin, lay aside, for Heaven's sake, that tragic air, more suited to the stage than to private society, and tell me to what cause I am indebted for this sudden visit from one I thought was basking in the sunny smiles of the fair beauties of England."