y, wounded. Emotion rose in a tide, but he
crushed it down.

He bent over her, speaking with deliberate tenderness.

"Julie, do you remember what you promised Lord Lackington when he was
dying?"

"Oh!" cried Julie.

She sprang to her feet, speechless and suffocated. Her eyes expressed a
mingled pride and terror.

He paused, confronting her with a pale resolution.

"You didn't know that I had seen him?"

"Know!"

She turned away fiercely, choking with sobs she could hardly control,
as the memory of that by-gone moment returned upon her.

"I thought as much," said Delafield, in a low voice. "You hoped never to
hear of your promise again."

She made no answer; but she sank again upon the seat beside the lake,
and supporting herself on one delicate hand, which clung to the coping
of the wall, she turned her pale and tear-stained face to the lake and
the evening sky. There was in her gesture an unconscious yearning, a
mute and anguished appeal, as though from the oppressions of human
character to the broad strength of nature, that was not lost on
Delafield. His mind became the centre of a swift and fierce debate. One
voice said: "Why are you persecuting her? Respect her weakness and her
grief." And another replied: "It is because she is weak that she must
yield--must allow herself to be guided and adored."

He came close to her again. Any passer-by might have supposed that they
were both looking at the distant boat and listening to the
pilgrimage chant.

"Do you think I don't understand why you made that promise?" he said,
very gently, and the mere self-control of his voice and manner carried a
spell with it for the woman beside him. "It was wrung out of you by
kindness for a dying man. You thought I should never know, or I should
never claim it. Well, I am selfish. I take advantage. I do claim it. I
saw Lord Lackington only a few hours before his death. 'She mustn't be
alone,' he said to me, several times. And then, almost at the last, 'Ask
her again. She'll consider it--she promised.'"

Julie turned impetuously.

"Neither of us is bound by that--neither of us."

Delafield smiled.

"Does that mean that I am asking you now because he bade me?"

A pause. Julie must needs raise her eyes to his. She flushed red and
withdrew them.

"No," he said, with a long breath, "you don't mean that, and you don't
think it. As for you--yes, you are bound! Julie, once more I bring you
my plea, and you must consider it