"It must be sad, indeed," said Arabella, in a low and hesitating tone,--"sad, indeed," she repeated. "But yet, perhaps--" and there she paused, leaving the sentence incomplete, while her colour varied like the morning sky as the sun rises in the east.
"Yet such is my fate," rejoined her companion; "such has been the weight upon my heart, which has crushed its energies, quelled its hopes, made the gay scenes of other lands all dull and empty, and even in the field deprived my arm of one-half its vigour. Oh! had the light of happy love been but before me, what deeds would I have done, what things accomplished--Arabella," he continued, taking her hand, and gazing in her face--"Arabella?"
She did not withdraw it; but she turned away her head, and with the fair fingers of the other hand chased away a bright drop from her dark eyelashes.
It was enough; his arm stole round her slight waist. She did not move. His lips pressed her soft cheek. A gasping sob was her only reply. "Arabella, Arabella! speak to me!" he said; "leave me not in doubt and misery!"
One moment more she remained still and silent; then, starting from his arms, she brushed her hair back from her forehead, with a sad and bewildered look, exclaiming, "Oh, Seymour, spare me!--This takes me by surprise--this is unkind;--think--think of all the risk, the danger, the sorrow----"
"I have thought, beloved," he replied, "through many a long and weary night, through many a heavy and irksome day. I have paused, and pondered, and doubted, and trembled, and accused myself of base selfishness, and asked if I could bring danger, and perhaps unhappiness, on her whom I love far, far before myself. Arabella, I have sought you not. I would never have sought you! But we have met; and in your presence, I am a poor, weak, irresolute creature, powerless against the mastery of the passion in my heart. Rebuke, revile, contemn, tread upon me, if you will; I am at your feet, to do with as it pleases you."
She shook her head with a sorrowful smile, murmuring, "It is for you I fear!" But, then, suddenly raising her eyes towards heaven, while her lips moved for a moment, she added, "No, Seymour, no; I will not plunge you in misery or danger. Your bright career shall not be cut off or stayed by me. No, no; it is better not to speak or think of such thing. My life may pass, cold and cheerless, in the hard bonds of a fate above my wishes; but you must cast off such feelings.--You must forget me, and in the end----"
"Forget you, Arabella?" he interrupted,--"forget you? You little know the man who loves you. Whether you be mine or another's, I will remember you till life's latest hour;" and he kept his word.
"I will never be another's," replied Arabella. "Fear not that, Seymour. Happily, all the interests, and all the jealousies of whatever monarch may sit upon the throne of this realm, are certain to combine in withholding my hand from any one. I have no sufficient dower to make me worthy of the suit of princes; the only attraction in their eyes might be some very distant and unreasonable claim to a crown I covet not; and I shall find it no difficult task to persuade the King to refuse this poor person to any one to whom it might convey a dangerous, though merely contingent right. I will live on," she continued, resuming her lighter tone--though there was ever a certain degree of melancholy ran through her gayest moods,--"I will live on in single freedom, with a heart, perhaps, not unsusceptible of affection, had fate blessed me with a humble station, but one which will never load itself with the guilt of bringing sorrow and destruction upon the head of another.--Nay, Seymour, nay, say no more! I esteem you highly, regard you much--perhaps if out of all the world----But let that pass! Why should I make you share regrets I myself may feel? It is in vain, it is impossible; so you must utter no farther words upon this matter, if you would have my company, for I must hear no more.--Come, let us walk out and talk of other things. We will go watch the rivulet that dances along, like the course of a happy life, sparkling as it goes, to find repose, at length, in the bosom of that vast, immeasurable ocean, where all streams end.--Nay, not a word more, if you love me!"
"I do! I do!" cried William Seymour, pressing his eager and burning lips upon her hand,--"I do! I do, Arabella! better than anything else on earth."