"I cannot help it, Montague ... nor could I help it when you took me out of the clutches of Major Allen, upon the Windmill-hill, nor when you were pleased to be so gracious as to approve my singing ... nor upon a great many other occasions, when it would have been wise for me to remember it, perhaps. But if I love you, and you love me, I cannot see how your age or mine either need interfere to prevent it." Perhaps at last Colonel Hubert arrived at the same satisfactory conclusion, for the conversation was a long one; and before it was ended, some little sketchings of his feelings during the early part of their acquaintance brought to Agnes' mind the soothing belief, that after the evening of the Clifton ball her image had never forsaken his fancy more, though it was by slow degrees that it had grown into what he called such "terrible strength" there, as to conquer every other feeling. Agnes listened to him as he stated this with most humble-minded and unfeigned astonishment, but also with most willing belief, and then, following his example, he quoted Shakspeare, exclaiming-- "And if an angel should have come to me And told me thus, I would have believed no tongue but Hubert's." CHAPTER XVIII. A RETROSPECT AND CONCLUSION. Mr. Willoughby was little less punctual to his appointment than Colonel Hubert; and as the young Nora, weary with her journey, and exhausted from the excitement of the scenes which followed it, had not yet left her bed, he too, had the advantage of a _tête-à-tête_. It is needless to enter upon any minute repetition of a narrative which had, in fact, little or no connexion with the personages of our drama. It was evident that Mr. Willoughby had suffered much, both from the early loss of his fair young wife, and the continued hostility, or, more properly speaking, the continued neglect of his family. He had exchanged into a regiment sent on a dangerous and, disagreeable service, and with broken spirits and failing health, might very likely have perished before it was ended, had not his "good gifts" very suddenly made captive the affections of a young girl almost as pretty as poor Sophia Compton, and quite as rich as she was the contrary. This marriage converted him into the only son and heir of a wealthy merchant; all his new family required of him, in exchange for their daughter and their wealth, was, that he should live amongst them. This he consented to do, but his life was not a happy one. With the prospect of great possessions before him, he was kept in almost penniless dependence upon his father-in-law; all his wants, indeed, profusely supplied, but with no more power to assist in the maintenance of the child he had left in England, than if he had been a slave chained to the oar.