hear me. There is but one way to prove my love, and my sanity,
and that is--"

"Well?" she said, almost touched by his earnestness.

"Raise your mask and try me! Show me your face and see if I do not love
you still!"

"Truly I know how much love you will have for me when it is revealed. Do
you know that no one has looked in my face for the last eight years."

He stood and gazed at her in wonder.

"It is so, Mr. Ormiston; and in my heart I have vowed a vow to plunge
headlong into the most loathsome plague-pit in London, rather than ever
raise it again. My friend, be satisfied. Go and leave me; go and forget
me."

"I can do neither until I have ceased to forget every thing earthly.
Madame, I implore you, hear me!"

"Mr. Ormiston, I tell you, you but court your own doom. No one can look
on me and live!"

"I will risk it," he said with an incredulous smile. "Only promise to
show me your face."

"Be it so then!" she cried almost fiercely. "I promise, and be the
consequences on your own head."

His whole face flushed with joy.

"I accept them. And when is that happy time to come?"

"Who knows! What must be done, had best be done quickly; but I tell thee
it were safer to play with the lightning's chain than tamper with what
thou art about to do."

"I take the risk! Will you raise your mask now?"

"No, no--I cannot! But yet, I may before the sun rises. My face"--with
bitter scorn--"shows better by darkness than by daylight. Will you be
out to see, the grand illumination."

"Most certainly."

"Then meet me here an hour after midnight, and the face so long hidden
shall be revealed. But, once again, on the threshold of doom, I entreat
you to pause."

"There is no such word for me!" he fiercely and exultingly cried. "I
have your promise, and I shall hold you to it! And, madame, if, at last,
you discover my love is changeless as fate itself, then--then may I not
dare to hope for a return?"

"Yes; then you may hope," she said, with cold mockery. "If your love
survives the sight, it will be mighty, indeed, and well worthy a
return."

"And you will return it?"

"I will."

"You will be my wife?"

"With all my heart!"

"My darling!" he cried, rapturously--"for you are mine already--how can
I ever thank you for this? If a whole lifetime devoted and consecrated
to your happiness can repay you, it shall be yours!"

During this rhapsody, her hand had been on the handle of the door. Now
she turned it.

"G