athed in anger: but it was a
vow not meant to be broken. You tremble! I am cruel in my wooing; but
this is not the moment for compliment and deception. You are _mine_,
Edith: I swore it to myself--ay, and to you. You cannot escape. You have
driven me to extremities; but they have succeeded. You are mine; or you
are--nothing."

"Nothing let it be," said Edith, over whose mind, prone to agitation and
terror, it was evident the fierce and domineering temper of the
individual could exercise an irresistible control, and who, though yet
striving to resist, was visibly sinking before his stern looks and
menacing words;--"let it be nothing! Kill me, if you will, as you have
already killed my cousin. Oh! mockery of passion, of humanity, of
decency, to speak to me thus;--to _me_, the relative, the more than
sister of him you have so basely and cruelly murdered!"

"I have murdered no one," said Braxley, with stony composure: "and if you
will but listen patiently, you will find I am stained by no crime save
that of loving a woman who forces me to woo her like a master, rather
than a slave. Your cousin is living and in safety."

"It is false," cried Edith, wringing her hands; "with my own eyes I saw
him fall, and fall covered with blood!"

"And from that moment you saw nothing more," rejoined Braxley. "The blood
came from the veins of others; he was carried away alive, and almost
unhurt. He is a captive,--a captive like yourself. And why? Shall I
remind my fair Edith how much of her hostility and scorn I owed to her
hot and foolish kinsman? how he persuaded her the love she so naturally
bore so near a relative was reason enough to reject the affection of a
suitor? how impossible she should listen to the dictates of her own
heart, or the calls of her interest, while misled by a counsellor so
indiscreet, and yet so trusted? Before that unlucky young man stepped
between me and my love, Edith Forrester could listen,--ay, and could
smile. Nay, deny it if you will; but hearken. Your cousin is safe; rely
upon that; but, rely, also, he will never again see the home of his
birth, or the kinswoman whose fortunes he has so opposed, until she is
the wife of the man he misjudges and hates. He is removed from my path:
it was necessary to my hopes. His life is, at all events, safe; his
deliverance rests with his kinswoman. When she has plighted her troth,
and surely she _will_ plight it--"

"Never! never!" cried Edith, starting up, her indign