"Sweetest, sweetest boy!" cried Helen, putting her quivering lips to his forehead; "you will then always remember that Helen so dearly loves Scotland as to be jealous, above all earthly things, for the lord regent's safety. Be his guardian angel. Beware of treason in man and woman, friend and kindred. It lurks, my cousin, under the most specious forms; and, as one, mark Lord Buchan; in short, have a care of all whom any of the house of Cummin may introduce. Watch over your general's life in the private hour. It is not the public field I fear for him; his valiant arm will there be his own guard! But, in the unreserved day of confidence, envy will point its dagger; and then, be as eyes to his too trusting soul--as a shield to his too confidently exposed breast!" As she spoke she strove to conceal her too eloquent face in the silken ringlets of her hair. "I will be all this," cried Edwin, who saw nothing in her tender solicitude but the ingenuous affection which glowed in his own heart; "and I will be your eyes, too, my cousin; for when I am absent with Sir William Wallace I shall consider myself your representative, and so will send you regular dispatches of all that happens to him." Thanks would have been a poor means of imparting what she felt at this assurance; and, rising from her seat, with some of Wallace's own resigned and enthusiastic expression in her face, she pressed Edwin's hand to her heart; then bowing her head to him, in token of gratitude, withdrew into an inner apartment. Chapter XXXIX. Stirling Castle and Council Hall. The countess' chivalric tribute from the window gave Wallace reason to anticipate her company in his visit to Lady Ruthven; and on finding the room vacant, he dispatched Edwin for his mother, that he might not be distressed by the unchecked advances of a woman whom, as the wife of Lord Mar, he was obliged to see, and whose weakness he pitied, as she belonged to a sex for which, in consideration of the felicity once bestowed on him by woman, he felt a peculiar tenderness. Respect the countess he could not; nor, indeed, could he feel any gratitude for a preference which seemed to him to have no foundations in the only true basis of love--the virtues of the object. For, as she acted against every moral law, against his declared sentiments, it was evident that she placed little value on his esteem; and therefore he despised, while he pitied, a human creature ungovernably yielding herself to the sway of her passions. In the midst of thoughts so little to her advantage, Lady Mar entered the room. Wallace turned to meet her; while she, hastening toward him, and dropping on one knee, exclaimed, "Let me be the first woman in Scotland to acknowledge its king!" Wallace put forth both his hands to raise her; and smiling, replied, "Lady Mar, you would do me an honor I can never claim."