was strong while we were weak,--and was strong to
comfort us. And then, Lord Lovel, what knew I of rank, living under
his father's wing? They told me I was the Lady Anna, and the children
scouted me. My mother was a countess. So she swore, and I at least
believed her. But if ever rank and title were a profitless burden,
they were to her. Do you think that I had learned then to love my
rank?"

"You have learned better now."

"I have learned,--but whether better I may doubt. There are lessons
which are quickly learned; and there are they who say that such are
the devil's lessons. I have not been strong enough not to learn. But
I must forget again, Lord Lovel. And you must forget also." He hardly
knew how to speak to her now;--whether it would be fit for him even
to wish to persuade her to be his, after she had told him that she
had given her troth to a tailor. His uneasy thoughts prompted him
with ideas which dismayed him. Could he take to his heart one who had
been pressed close in so vile a grasp? Could he accept a heart that
had once been promised to a tailor's workman? Would not all the world
know and say that he had done it solely for the money,--even should
he succeed in doing it? And yet to fail in this enterprise,--to
abandon all,--to give up so enticing a road to wealth! Then he
remembered what he had said,--how he had pledged himself to abandon
the lawsuit,--how convinced he had been that this girl was heiress to
the Lovel wealth, who now told him that she had engaged herself to
marry a tailor.

There was nothing more that either of them could say to the other at
the moment, and they went back in silence to the inn.

CHAPTER XVII.

THE JOURNEY HOME.

In absolute silence Lord Lovel and Lady Anna walked back to the inn.
He had been dumbfoundered,--nearly so by her first abrupt statement,
and then altogether by the arguments with which she had defended
herself. She had nothing further to say. She had, indeed, said all,
and had marvelled at her own eloquence while she was speaking. Nor
was there absent from her a certain pride in that she had done the
thing that was right, and had dared to defend herself. She was full
of regrets,--almost of remorse; but, nevertheless, she was proud. He
knew it all now, and one of her great difficulties had been overcome.

And she was fully resolved that as she had dared to tell him, and
to face his anger, his reproaches, his scorn, she would not falter
before the s