‘My motives are honourable enough,’ replied the other, with some difficulty retaining his composure. ‘I pray you attribute no hidden meaning to what I have to say. Be frank and open with me, whether friend or foe, as I swear I am frank and open with you.’
‘I believe it!’ exclaimed the other, extending him his hand; but Maxwell, without taking it, folded his arms across his heart, and proceeded in the low quiet tones of repressed excitement—
‘I have no right to assume that your presence here in silence and secrecy is for any other than a political object, and yet from my own knowledge I am satisfied that there are further motives of a private nature. If you feel that what I have done for you to-night deserves any return, I claim your confidence in a matter that is to me one of life and death.’
He wiped the drops from his pale face as he spoke, and the stranger, pitying his obvious agitation, motioned to him courteously to proceed.
‘There is a lady of the Court,’ resumed Maxwell, still in the same concentrated voice, ‘who has allowed herself to hold clandestine interviews with you in this spot by night. No man alive shall make me believe that anything but an ardent and sincere affection would tempt that lady so far to commit herself. Mistress Carmichael is above the weaknesses and petty vanities of her sex. I demand of you, on your honour as a gentleman, to clear her conduct in my eyes by avowing that you are her lover.’
The stranger had started violently when he heard mentioned the proper name of the adventurous damsel, whom in truth he was momentarily expecting, but the lower part of his face was again concealed in his cloak, and his whole frame was shaking from some strongly-curbed emotion, while he demanded—
‘By what right do you ask so unwarrantable a question?’
‘By the right of a pure and holy affection,’ answered Maxwell, gravely; ‘by the right of an unselfish love that would even give her up ungrudgingly to a worthy rival!’
‘Hoity-toity, young gentleman!’ exclaimed the stranger, breaking forth into an uncontrollable fit of laughter, all the more violent that he dared not indulge in it above his breath. ‘Thou art not likely to lose aught for lack of asking; thou art one of these wild Iceland falcons, I warrant me, that will fly their pitch, hooded and jessed and all, to strike at every quarry alike. I ought to be angry with thee, man; but I cannot for the life of me. In faith I forgive thee; I forgive thee were it but for the jest’s sake.’