to-morrow I will return your letters. I will, at least, try to avoid seeing you;—but, surely, that was a step."
"It was only the wind in the curtain," said Sir George, who, like herself, had started at some slight noise.
"Alas!" exclaimed she, "is not this very fear degrading? Why should I care that my words may be overheard? Why should I shrink from discovery?"
"Ah," exclaimed her companion, "if you loved me with but a shadow of the love that I bear towards you, you would not dread a little risk—it is but a little—for my sake."
"Ah," cried Henrietta, "do you think it is merely the consequence from which I shrink? Ah, if my own heart did but tell me that I was right, how little I should care for anything else!"
"I care for nothing but yourself," interrupted her companion.
"Have you no pity for the misery that you will inflict upon me?"
Henrietta's voice failed her, she could only wring her hands with a passionate gesture of
