p faith with you. He has been driven from
society by a foul slander; that slander I am to sift and confute. It will
be long and difficult; but I shall do it; and you could help me if you
chose. But that I will not be so cruel as to ask."

Arthur bit his lip with jealous rage; but he was naturally cunning, and
his cunning showed him there was at present but one road to Helen's
heart. He quelled his torture as well as he could, and resolved to take
that road. He reflected a moment, and then he said:

"If you succeed in that, will you marry me next day?"

"I will, upon my honor."

"Then I will help you."

"Arthur, think what you say. Women have loved as unselfishly as this; but
no man, that ever I heard of."

"No man ever did love a woman as I love you. Yes, I would rather help
you, though with a sore heart, than hold aloof from you. What have we to
do together?"

"Did I not tell you?--to clear his character of a foul stigma, and
restore him to England, and to the world which he is so fitted to adorn."

"Yes, yes," said Arthur; "but who is it? Why do I ask, though? He must be
a stranger to me."

"No stranger at all," said Helen; "but one who is almost as unjust to you
as the world has been to him;" then, fixing her eyes full on him, she
said, "Arthur, it is your old friend and tutor, Robert Penfold."

CHAPTER LV.

ARTHUR WARDLAW was thunderstruck; and for some time sat stupidly staring
at her. And to this blank gaze succeeded a look of abject terror, which
seemed to her strange and beyond the occasion. But this was not all; for,
after glaring at her with scared eyes and ashy cheeks a moment or two, he
got up and literally staggered out of the room without a word.

He had been taken by surprise, and, for once, all his arts had failed
him.

Helen, whose eyes had never left his face, and had followed his retiring
figure, was frightened at the weight of the blow she had struck; and
strange thoughts and conjectures filled her mind. Hitherto, she had felt
sure Robert Penfold was under a delusion as to Arthur Wardlaw, and that
his suspicions were as unjust as they certainly were vague. Yet now, at
the name of Robert Penfold, Arthur turned pale, and fled like a guilty
thing. This was a coincidence that confirmed her good opinion of Robert
Penfold, and gave her ugly thoughts of Arthur. Still, she was one very
slow to condemn a friend, and too generous and candid to condemn on
suspicion; so she resolved as far