“Hold!” cried Bernard, laying his hand on her arm. “Dost know I could save thy father?”
“Canst thou?” inquired Evaline, with great earnestness. “But if even thou canst,” she added, mournfully, “thou wilt not.”
“What of him that sent thee to me?” said Bernard. “Dost thou not know, from the opposition of your creeds, that there is between you a great bar, and that thou shalt never wed him?”
“Wed him?” echoed Evaline, tremulously.
“Thou lovest him!” answered Bernard.
Notwithstanding her excessive alarm, Evaline, whether because she was taken by surprise, or from some more secret cause, could not repress a slight blush, and her eyes sank before the earnest gaze of her interlocutor.
“Thou lovest him!” repeated the latter. “And for thy sake, lady, I will even befriend a Papist. Thy father shall be set free.”
“Alas, Sir!” answered Evaline, “he is now, I fear me, beyond thy help. He has been removed to London.”
“Go thou also to London, then,” returned Bernard. “I will follow thee; and again I promise thee, on my troth, he shall be given his liberty.”
The confident tone in which he spoke, with the assurance she had received from Hildebrand, on his first naming him to her, that he would be able to render her the most eminent services, and which assurance now came to her recollection, did not pass Evaline unheeded. His altered manner, too, which had suddenly become kind and compassionate, had an effect upon her; and, being so different from what she had looked for, called up in her bosom the liveliest expectations. Nevertheless, her voice faltered in her reply.