; it lies here at your service. If your
father's daughter likes to shoot me, from one point of view it will be
just; and but for one reason, I care not. Don't look at me with pity,
if you please. For what I have done I feel no remorse, no shadow of
repentance. It was the best action of my life. But time will fail,
unless you call upon your courage speedily. None of your family lack
that; and I know that you possess it. Call your spirit up, my dear."

"Oh, please not to call me that! How dare you call me that?"

"That is right. I did it on purpose. And yet I am your uncle. Not by the
laws of men, but by the laws of God--if there are such things. Now, have
you the strength to hear me?"

"Yes; I am quite recovered now. I can follow every word you say.
But--but I must sit down again."

"Certainly. Sit there, and I will stand. I will not touch or come nearer
to you than a story such as mine requires. You know your own side of it;
now hear mine.

"More than fifty years ago there was a brave young nobleman, handsome,
rich, accomplished, strong, not given to drink or gambling, or any
fashionable vices. His faults were few, and chiefly three--he had
a headstrong will, loved money, and possessed no heart at all. With
chances in his favor, this man might have done as most men do who have
such gifts from fortune. But he happened to meet with a maiden far
beneath him in this noble world, and he set his affections--such as they
were--upon that poor young damsel.

"This was Winifred Hoyle, the daughter of Thomas Hoyle, a farmer, in a
lonely part of Hampshire, and among the moors of Rambledon. The nobleman
lost his way, while fishing, and being thirsty, went to ask for milk.
What matter how it came about? He managed to win her heart before she
heard of his rank and title. He persuaded her even to come and meet him
in the valley far from her father's house, where he was wont to angle;
and there, on a lonely wooden bridge across a little river, he knelt
down (as men used to do) and pledged his solemn truth to her. His solemn
lie--his solemn lie!

"Such love as his could not overleap the bars of rank or the pale of
wealth--are you listening to me carefully?--or, at any rate, not both
of them. If the poor farmer could only have given his Winifred 50,000
pounds, the peer would have dropped his pride, perhaps, so far as to be
honest. But farmers in that land are poor, and Mr. Hoyle could give
his only child his blessing only. And thi