ords Sir Lionel said to me,
when he was dying of his wound, were, that he should not live to see
the marriage; but lie hoped I might. Years afterwards, when Lucy was
placed with Lady Verner--I knew, no other friend in Europe to whom I
would entrust her--her letters to me were filled with Lionel Verner.
'Lionel was so kind to her!'--'Everybody liked Lionel!' In one shape or
other you were sure to be the theme. I heard how you lost the estate; of
your coming to stay at Lady Verner's; of a long illness you had there;
of your regaining the estate through the death of the Massingbirds;
and--next--of your marriage to Frederick Massingbird's widow. From that
time Lucy said less: in fact, her letters were nearly silent as to you:
and, for myself, I never gave another thought to the subject. Your
present communication has taken me entirely by surprise."

"But you will give her to me?"

"I had rather--forgive me if I speak candidly--that she married one who
had not called another woman wife."

"I heartily wish I never had called another woman wife," was the
response of Lionel. "But I cannot alter the past. I shall not make Lucy
the less happy; and, for moving her--I tell you that my love for her,
throughout, has been so great, as to have put it almost beyond the power
of suppression."

A servant entered, and said my lady was waiting tea. Lionel waved his
hand towards the man with an impatient movement, and they were left at
peace again.

"You tell me that her heart is engaged in this, as well as yours?"
resumed Sir Henry.

A half-smile flitted for a moment over Lionel's face; he was recalling
Lucy's whispered words to him that very afternoon.

"Yes," he answered, "her heart is bound up in me: I may almost say her
life. If ever love served out its apprenticeship, Sir Henry, ours has.
It is stronger than time and change."

"Well, I suppose you must have her," conceded Sir Henry. "But for your
own marriage, I should have looked on this as a natural result. What
about the revenues of Verner's Pride?"

"I am in debt," freely acknowledged Lionel. "In my wife's time we spent
too much, and outran our means. Part of my income for three or four
years must be set apart to pay it off."

He might have said, "In my wife's time _she_ spent too much;" said it
with truth. But, as he spared her feelings, living, so he spared her
memory, dead.

"Whoever takes Lucy, takes thirty thousand pounds on her wedding-day,"
quietly remarked Si