oor grandmamma go with me?"

"Yes."

"And you will not talk with me any more?"

"Not if you do not wish it. And now," he said, "that I have submitted to
all these hard conditions, will you suffer me to raise you?"

He took her hands and lifted her up; they were cold, and she was
trembling and shivering. He held them a moment; she tried to withdraw
them, and he let them go.

"Farewell, Agnes!" he said. "I am going."

She raised both her hands and pressed the sharp cross to her bosom, but
made no answer.

"I yield to your will," he continued. "Immediately when I leave you,
your grandmother will come to you, and the attendants who brought you
here will conduct you to the high-road. For me, since it is your will, I
part here. Farewell, Agnes!"

He held out his hand, but she stood as before, pale and silent, with her
hands clasped on her breast.

"Do your vows forbid even a farewell to a poor, humble friend?" said the
knight, in a low tone.

"I cannot," said Agnes, speaking at broken intervals, in a suffocating
voice,--"for _your_ sake I cannot! I bear this pain for you,--for
_you_! Oh, repent, and meet me in heaven!"

She gave him her hand; he kneeled and kissed it, pressed it to his
forehead, then rose and left the room.

For a moment after the departure of the Cavalier, Agnes felt a bitter
pang,--the pain which one feels on first realizing that a dear friend
is lost forever; and then, rousing herself with a start and a sigh, she
hurried into the inner room and threw herself on her knees, giving
thanks that the dreadful trial was past and that she had not been left
to fail.

In a few moments she heard the voice of her grandmother in the outer
apartment, and the old wrinkled creature clasped her grandchild in her
arms, and wept with a passionate abandonment of fondness, calling her by
every tender and endearing name which mothers give to their infants.

"After all," said Elsie, "these are not such bad people, and I have been
right well entertained among them. They are of ourselves,--they do not
prey on the poor, but only on our enemies, the princes and nobles, who
look on us as sheep to be shorn and slaughtered for their wearing and
eating. These men are none such, but pitiful to poor peasants and old
widows, whom they feed and clothe out of the spoils of the rich. As to
their captain,--would you believe it?--he is the same handsome gentleman
who once gave you a ring,--you may have forgotten him, as you ne