'
cried Devereux.

'That unhappy young woman, Captain Devereux, her name is Glynn, whom you
have betrayed under a promise of marriage.'

That moment Devereux was on his feet. It was the apparition of Devereux;
a blue fire gleaming in his eyes, not a word from his white lips, while
three seconds might have ticked from Mrs. Irons's prosy old clock on the
stair-head; his slender hand was outstretched in appeal and defiance,
and something half-celestial, half-infernal--the fallen angelic--in his
whole face and bearing.

'May my merciful Creator strike me dead, here at your feet, Doctor
Walsingham, but 'tis a lie,' cried he. 'I never promised--she'll tell
you. I thought she told you long ago. 'Twas that devil incarnate, her
mother, who forged the lie, why or where-fore, except for her fiendish
love of mischief, I know not.'

'I cannot tell, Sir, about your promise,' said the doctor gravely; 'with
or without it, the crime is heinous, the cruelty immeasurable.'

'Dr. Walsingham,' cried Dick Devereux, a strange scorn ringing in his
accents, 'with all your learning you don't know the world; you don't
know human nature; you don't see what's passing in this very village
before your eyes every day you live. I'm not worse than others; I'm not
half so bad as fifty older fellows who ought to know better; but I'm
_sorry_, and 'tisn't easy to say that, for I'm as proud, proud as the
devil, proud as you; and if it were to my Maker, what more can I say?
I'm sorry, and if Heaven forgives us when we repent, I think our
wretched fellow-mortals may.'

'Captain Devereux, I've nothing to forgive,' said the parson, kindly.

'But I tell you, Sir, this cruel, unmeaning separation will be my
eternal ruin,' cried Devereux. 'Listen to me--by Heaven, you shall. I've
fought a hard battle, Sir! I've tried to forget her--to _hate_ her--it
won't do. I tell you, Dr. Walsingham, 'tis not in your nature to
comprehend the intensity of my love--you can't. I don't blame you. But I
think, Sir--I think I _might_ make her like me, Sir. They come at last,
sometimes, to like those that love them so--so _desperately: that_ may
not be for me, 'tis true. I only ask to plead my own sad cause. I only
want to see her--gracious Heaven--but to see her--to show her how I was
wronged--to tell her she can make me what she will--an honourable, pure,
self-denying, devoted man, or leave me in the dark, alone, with nothing
for it but to wrap my cloak about my head, and lea