Leoline hastened to her guardian, and the brothers were left alone.
Nothing could be more dissimilar than the features and the respective characters of Otho and Warbeck. Otho’s countenance was flushed with the brown hues of health; his eyes were of the brightest hazel: his dark hair wreathed in short curls round his open and fearless brow; the jest ever echoed on his lips, and his step was bounding as the foot of the hunter of the Alps. Bold and light was his spirit; if at times he betrayed the haughty insolence of youth, he felt generously, and though not ever ready to confess sorrow for a fault, he was at least ready to brave peril for a friend.
But Warbeck’s frame, though of equal strength, was more slender in its proportions than that of his brother; the fair long hair that characterized his northern race hung on either side of a countenance calm and pale, and deeply impressed with thought, even to sadness. His features, more majestic and regular than Otho’s, rarely varied in their expression. More resolute even than Otho, he was less impetuous; more impassioned, he was also less capricious.
The brothers remained silent after Leoline had left them. Otho carelessly braced on his sword, that he had laid aside on the grass; but Warbeck gathered up the flowers that had been touched by the soft hand of Leoline, and placed them in his bosom.
The action disturbed Otho; he bit his lip, and changed colour; at length he said, with a forced laugh,—
“It must be confessed, brother, that you carry your affection for our fair cousin to a degree that even relationship seems scarcely to warrant.”
“It is true,” said Warbeck, calmly; “I love her with a love surpassing that of blood.”
“How!” said Otho, fiercely: “do you dare to think of Leoline as a bride?”
“Dare!” repeated Warbeck, turning yet paler than his wonted hue.
“Yes, I have said the word! Know, Warbeck, that I, too, love Leoline; I, too, claim her as my bride; and never, while I can wield a sword, never, while I wear the spurs of knighthood, will I render my claim to a living rival,—even,” he added, sinking his voice, “though that rival be my brother!”