e
from married obligations, would have rendered his manner cold to Lucy
Tempest. Whether Frederick Massingbird was alive or not, _he_ must be a
man isolated from other wedded ties, so long as Sibylla remained on the
earth. The kind young face, held up to him in its grief, disarmed his
reserve. He spoke out to Lucy as freely as he had done in that long-ago
illness, when she was his full confidante. Nay, whether from her looks,
or from some lately untouched chord in his memory reawakened, that old
time was before him now, rather than the present, as his next words
proved.

"Lucy, with one thing and another, my heart is half broken. I wish I had
died in that illness. Better for me! Better--perhaps--for you."

"Not for me," said she, through her tears. "Do not think of me. I wish I
could help you in this great sorrow!"

"Help from you of any sort, Lucy, I forfeited in my blind wilfulness,"
he hoarsely whispered. "God bless you!" he added, wringing her hands to
pain. "God bless you for ever!"

She did not loose them. He was about to draw his hands away, but she
held them still, her tears and sobs nearly choking her.

"You spoke of India. Should it be that land that you choose for your
exile, go to papa. He may be able to do great things for you. And, if in
his power, he _would_ do them, for Sir Lionel Verner's sake. Papa longs
to know you. He always says so much about you in his letters to me."

"You have never told me so, Lucy."

"I thought it better not to talk to you too much," she simply said. "And
you have not been always at Deerham."

Lionel looked at her, holding her hands still. She knew how futile it
was to affect ignorance of truths in that moment of unreserve; she knew
that her mind and its feelings were as clear to Lionel as though she had
been made of glass, and she spoke freely in her open simplicity. She
knew, probably, that his deepest love and esteem were given to her.
Lionel knew it, if she did not; knew it to his very heart's core. He
could only reiterate his prayer, as he finally turned from her--"God
bless you, Lucy, for ever, and for ever!"

CHAPTER LXV.

CAPTAIN CANNONBY.

Deerham abounded in inns. How they all contrived to get a living, nobody
could imagine. That they did jog along somehow, was evident; but they
appeared to be generally as void of bustle as were their lazy
sign-boards, basking in the sun on a summer's day. The best in the
place, one with rather more pretension to