"And what tidings are there of the Duke of Rothesay?"
"I have heard of none," said Howard, on whom that name when uttered by her lips, fell as a mortal blight. "Lady Drummond, we are about to engage in a close, and, it must be, desperate conflict, with the king of the Scottish mariners, and it may be that you will never again be troubled by the voice or presence of Edmund Howard. Oh, think over all I have dared to urge, during the many days it has been my happiness to know you and to seek your esteem. You know my secret; say, if I survive to-night, may I hope for something more than friendship?"
"Your secret," reiterated Margaret, as her fine blue eyes filled with tears; "alas, fair sir, you know not mine. I admire and most sincerely respect you, Edmund Howard; but more I dare not say—so, I beseech you, cease to urge me further on this most painful subject."
"True, true," said Howard, beating his breast, "I have indeed but little to offer you compared with what you have lost. It may be weakness——"
"The weakness of the strong man and of the gallant heart."
"Alas! in love we ever carry more sail than ballast—who can control the heart in love——"
"If you knew all, you never again would address me thus. Oh, talk not of love to me—it is in vain, nor dare I listen."
"Alas, that I should hear this doom from your own lips at last, lady! I will quit this wandering life of mariner, for I have one of those happy homes that are only to be found in England; where the woods are green, and our painted windows open down to soft and sunny lawns, instead of iron grates that grimly peer through deep fosses and guarded barbicans, as here in Scotland, lady. There no rude barons, or lawless lairds, ride from tower to tower with spears and torches in their train, no hostile clansmen wage eternal war, making their life but a mission of military vengeance and feudal hatred; and there no venal peers are ever ready to sell their country and their king, her rights or her honour for foreign gold. Oh no; in merry England we know nothing of transmitted hatred, of Highland raids and border forays. I love you, lady, well, and, with you, I fain would share that quiet English home; I love you passionately, and denial is death, and worse than death to me! and I say so now when on the eve of battle with one who was never foiled or vanquished on the sea. In that happy home, if spared to see it, I could worship you as a monk who serves his altar, and treasure you as a miser hoards his treasure. Oh do not turn from me as if I was hateful," continued Howard, borne away by his passion and finding eloquence in the very depth of it; "'tis true I am an Englishman, lady, and that you are a Scot—but can a few miles of land or of water make such an evil difference in our tempers or our race——"
"Oh no, it is not hate that makes me turn away, but true sorrow for yourself, my good and noble Howard," said Margaret, as she pressed his hands in hers; for his honest passion and gentle bearing touched her to the soul, and no woman ever hears a man say he loves her without feeling a more than common interest in him; but happily for both, this painful interview was cut short by the stentorian voice of John o'Lynne, who cried through the poop door,—
"Yoho, Captain Howard; the Scots are within a mile of us and bring down the breeze with them, and it freshens fast."