“Let me go on my way alone, while there is time. It is hard to touch pitch and keep undefiled. Child, you are too pure to estimate your danger. If you remained as innocent as one of God’s angels, the world would still condemn you.”
Her slender fingers twined themselves round his wrist, so tenderly!—and she bent down her soft cheek till its blush was hidden on his hand. Then she looked up in his face with a bright, trustful smile.
“Great happiness can not be bought without a price. I fear no reproach so much as that of my own conscience. Do not think I delude myself as to the risk I am incurring. But if I am innocent, I shall never hear or heed what the world may say; if I am guilty, I have no right to complain of its scorn.”
Hardened unbeliever as he was, Royston could have bowed himself there, and worshiped at her feet. But he would not confess his admiration, still less betray his triumph. He raised the little white hand that was free gently to his lips. Not with more reverent courtesy could he have done homage to an anointed queen.
“I wish I were worthier of you,” he murmured, and no more was said then.
As they walked slowly homeward, the sullen clouds broke away from the face of the sun; but a weatherwise observer could have told that the truce was only treacherous. The tempest bided its time.
CHAPTER XIX.
It is not pleasant to stand by and assist at each step of an incantation that draws down a star from heaven, or darkens the face of the moon. Let us be content to accept the result, when it is forced upon us, without inquiring too minutely into the process. Not with impunity can even the Adepts gain and keep the secrets of their evil Abracadabra. The beard of Merlin is gray before its time; premature wrinkles furrow the 54 brow of Canidia; though the terror of his stony eyes may keep the fiends at bay, the death-sleep of Michael Scott is not untroubled; the pillars of Melrose shake ever and anon as though an earthquake passed by, and the monks cross themselves in fear and pity, for they know that the awful wizard is turning restlessly in his grave.
As we are not writing a three-volume novel, we have a right, perhaps, not to linger over this part of our story. For any one who likes to indulge a somewhat morbid taste, or who happens to be keen about physiology, there is daily food sufficient in those ingenious romances d’Outre-mer.