lm and firm as she proceeded. "You profess to love me:
I am not worthy your love; and if, Count Devereux, I do not reject nor
disclaim it--for I am a woman, and a weak and fond one--I will not at
least wrong you by encouraging hopes which I may not and I dare not
fulfil. I cannot,--" here she spoke with a fearful distinctness,--"I
cannot, I can never be yours; and when you ask me to be so, you know not
what you ask nor what perils you incur. Enough; I am grateful to
you. The poor exiled girl is grateful for your esteem--and--and your
affection. She will never forget them,--never! But be this our last
meeting--our very last--God bless you, Morton!" and, as she read my
heart, pierced and agonized as it was, in my countenance, Isora
bent over me, for I knelt beside her, and I felt her tears upon my
cheek,--"God bless you--and farewell!"

"You insult, you wound me," said I, bitterly, "by this cold and taunting
kindness; tell me, tell me only, who it is that you love better than
me."

Isora had turned to leave me, for I was too proud to detain her; but
when I said this, she came back, after a moment's pause, and laid her
hand upon my arm.

"If it make you happy to know _my_ unhappiness," she said, and the tone
of her voice made me look full in her face, which was one deep blush,
"know that I am not insensible--"

I heard no more: my lips pressed themselves involuntarily to hers,--a
long, long kiss,--burning, intense, concentrating emotion, heart, soul,
all the rays of life's light into a single focus; and she tore herself
away from me,--and I was alone.

CHAPTER IX.

A DISCOVERY AND A DEPARTURE.

I HASTENED home after my eventful interview with Isora, and gave myself
up to tumultuous and wild conjecture. Aubrey sought me the next morning:
I narrated to him all that had occurred: he said little, but that little
enraged me, for it was contrary to the dictates of my own wishes. The
character of Morose in the "Silent Woman" is by no means an uncommon
one. Many men--certainly many lovers--would say with equal truth, always
provided they had equal candour, "All discourses but my own afflict
me; they seem harsh, impertinent, and irksome." Certainly I felt that
amiable sentiment most sincerely with regard to Aubrey. I left him
abruptly: a resolution possessed me. "I will see," said I, "this
Barnard; I will lie in wait for him; I will demand and obtain, though
it be by force, the secret which evidently subsists between h