ly, like a coward as he was, "ask me no more,
my mind is made up forever; I will not do this scoundrelly, heartless,
beastly, ungrateful action you have been pushing me to so long."

"Take care, Charles, take care," said the old woman, trembling with
passion, for this was a new tone for her son to take with her. "You had
my blessing the other day, and you saw what followed it; do not tempt me
to curse an undutiful, disobedient, ungrateful son."

"I must take my chance," said he, desperately, "for I am under a curse
any way! I placed my ring on her finger, and held up my hand to God and
swore she should be my wife; she has my ring and my oath, and I will not
perjure myself even for my mother."

"Your ring! Not the ruby ring I gave you from your dead father's
finger--not that! not that!"

"Yes! yes! I tell you yes! and if he was alive, and saw her, and knew
her goodness, he would have pity on me, but I have no friend; you
see how ill you have made me, but you have no pity; I could not have
believed it; but, since you have no mercy on me, I will have the more
mercy on myself; I marry her to-morrow, and put an end to all this
shuffling and maneuvering against an angel! I am not worthy of her, but
I'll marry her to-morrow. Good-by."

"Stay!" said the old woman, in a terrible voice; "before you destroy
me and all I have lived for, and suffered, and pinched for, hear me; if
that ring is not off the hussy's finger in half an hour, and you my son
again, I fall on this sand and--"

"Then God have mercy upon me, for I'll see the whole creation lost
eternally ere I'll wrong the only creature that is an ornament to the
world."

He was desperate; and the weak, driven to desperation, are more furious
than the strong.

It was by Heaven's mercy that neither mother nor son had time to speak
again.

As they faced each other, with flaming eyes and faces, all self-command
gone, about to utter hasty words, and lay up regret, perhaps for all
their lives to come, in a moment, as if she had started from the earth,
Christie Johnstone stood between them!

Gatty's words, and, still more, his hesitation, had made her quick
intelligence suspect. She had resolved to know the truth; the boats
offered every facility for listening--she had heard every word.

She stood between the mother and son.

They were confused, abashed, and the hot blood began to leave their
faces.

She stood erect like a statue, her cheek pale as ashes, her eyes