ced to listen, and she listened with
a vague surprise, looking at him with a cold stare.

"You seem to me," said she, "to speak as though you were unwilling to
go--or afraid."

"Pardon me, Lady Chetwynde," said Gualtier, "you can not think that.
I have said that I would go, but that, as I may never see you again,
I wish to say something. I wish, in fact, now, after all these years,
to have a final understanding with you."

"Well?" said Hilda.

"I need not remind you of the past," said Gualtier, "or of my blind
obedience to all your mandates. Two events at least stand out
conspicuously. I have assisted you to the best of my power. Why I did
so must be evident to you. You know very well that it was no sordid
motive on my part, no hate toward others, no desire for vengeance,
but something far different--something which has animated me for
years, so that it was enough that you gave a command for me to obey.
For years I have been thus at your call like a slave, and now, after
all these years--now, that I depart on my last and most perilous
mission, and am speaking to you words which may possibly be the last
that you will ever hear from me--I wish to implore you, to beseech
you, to promise me that reward which you must know I have always
looked forward to, and which can be the only possible recompense to
one like me for services like mine."

He stopped and looked imploringly at her.

"And what is that?" asked Hilda, mechanically, as though she did not
fully understand him.

"_Yourself_," said Gualtier, in a low, earnest voice, with all his
soul in the glance which he threw upon her.

The moment that he said the word Hilda started back with a gesture of
impatience and contempt, and regarded him with an expression of anger
and indignation, and with a frown so black that it seemed as if she
would have blasted him with her look had she been able. Gualtier,
however, did not shrink from her fierce glance. His eyes were no
longer lowered before hers. He regarded her fixedly, calmly, yet
respectfully, with his head erect, and no trace of his old
unreasoning submission in his face and manner. Surprised as Hilda had
evidently been at his words, she seemed no less surprised at his
changed demeanor. It was the first time in her life that she had seen
in him any revelation of manhood; and that view opened up to her very
unpleasant possibilities.

"This is not a time," she said at length, in a sharp voice, "for such
nonsense a