"Not our engagements, sweet Alice," replied Langford; "for while I hold myself bound for ever to you. I ask you to make no engagement, I suffer you to make none, till you have your father's full consent, and my love for you shall be told to him immediately. But let me first inform you how I am situated. The property which I actually possess is but small; sufficient, indeed, to maintain me in comfort and independence as a gentleman, but no more. My name and reputation, with my companions in the field, and with those under whom I have served, is, I have every cause to believe, fair--may I say it without vanity?--high. This small fortune, and this good reputation, are all that I absolutely have to offer; but, at the same time, I tell you that a much larger fortune, one that would at once place me on a level, in those respects, with yourself, is withheld from me unjustly, and cannot, I fear, be recovered by law."
"What matters it?" demanded Alice. "What matters it, Langford? My father's consent once given, will not his house, his fortune, be our own? What need of more?"
"To you, perhaps not, Alice," replied her lover. "But to me it would be painful--it would be the only painful part of my fate to know that a great disparity existed between your fortune and mine--to have any one insinuate that my Alice had married a mere adventurer. In regard, too, to your father's fortune, Alice, I have much, hereafter to say to you; I have something even to say to him. But of that we will not speak now. Suffice it that I could bear no great disparity. But, besides," he added, seeing her about to speak, "I have made a solemn promise, Alice, to pursue, without pause or hesitation, the recovery of this property."
"But you said," exclaimed Alice, "that it could not be recovered by law."
"It cannot," replied Langford, "for the papers by which it could be recovered are withheld from me by one who is both powerful and daring, and I cannot obtain them by any act which the law would justify."
"Then, give it up altogether," exclaimed Alice. "Do not, do not, Langford, attempt anything that is not justified by the law."
"But sometimes," replied her lover, "the law is in itself unjust, or else, as in the present instance, is impotent to work redress, and would justify the act if it proved successful. The papers are withheld from me by one, as I have said, who is both powerful and daring. What mandate of the law can make him give them up? While I, by force, if I chose to exert it, might take them for myself; and the possession of them would at once justify the deed by which they were acquired."
"Oh, no, no! do not attempt it, Langford," cried Alice. "Suppose you were to fail in obtaining them, what terrible consequences might ensue! He might resist force by force; blood might be spilt, and the man I love become a murderer."
Langford paused for a moment upon the words, "The man I love;" and, casting his eyes towards the ground, he fell into a sweet but short reverie. A moment after, however, he returned to the subject, saying, "But my promise, Alice, my promise to the dead?"
"Langford," said Alice gravely, and somewhat sadly, laying her right hand at the same time upon his, in which he had continued to hold her left, and gazing up in his face with a look of tenderness and regard: "Langford, I am no great casuist in such matters; but I have always heard that no promise to do what is unlawful can be binding upon any man. God forbid that I should hold that it is right to do any evil, even to the breaking of the slightest promise; but here, Langford, you are between two evils: the breaking of a promise, and the committing of an unlawful act. The breaking of that promise can do wrong to no one; the keeping it may bring misery on yourself, on me, on all who know you; may be followed by bloodshed, ay! and the loss of your good name."