Honoria rose to comply with her benefactor's wish, with that deferential manner which she always preserved in her intercourse with him, and they walked out upon the velvet lawn. Across the lawn lay the beech-avenue, and it was thither Sir Oswald directed his steps.
"Honoria," he said, after a silence of some duration, "if you knew how much doubt—how much hesitation I experienced before I came here to-day—how much I still question the wisdom of my coming—I think you would pity me. But I am here, and I must needs speak plainly, if I am to speak at all. Long ago I tried to think that my interest in your fate was only a natural impulse of charity—only an ordinary tribute to gifts so far above the common. I tried to think this, and I acted with the cold, calculating wisdom of a man of the world, when I marked out for you a career by which you might win distinction for yourself, and placed you in the way of following that career. I meant to spend last year upon the Continent. I did not expect to see you once in twelve months; but the strange influence which possessed me in the hour of our first meeting grew stronger upon me day by day. In spite of myself, I thought of you; in spite of myself I came here again and again, to look upon your face, to hear your voice, for a few brief moments, and then to go out into the world, to find it darker and colder by contrast with the brightness of your beauty. Little by little, the idea of your becoming a public singer became odious to me," continued Sir Oswald. "At first I thought with pride of the success which would be yours, the worship which would be offered at your shrine; but my feeling changed completely before long, and I shuddered at the image of your triumphs, for those triumphs must, doubtless, separate us for ever. Why should I dwell upon this change of feeling? You must have already guessed the secret of my heart. Tell me that you do not despise me!"
"Despise you, Sir Oswald!—you, the noblest and most generous of men! Surely, you must know that I admire and reverence you for all your noble qualities, as well as for your goodness to a wretched creature like me."
"But, Honoria, I want something more than your esteem. Do you remember the night I first heard you singing in the market-place on the north road?"
"Can I ever forget that miserable night?" cried the girl, in a tone of surprise—the question seemed so strange to her—"that bitter hour, in which you came to my rescue?"
"Do you remember the song you were singing—the last song you ever sang in the streets?"
Honoria Milford paused for some moments before answering It was evident that she could not at first recall the memory of that last song.
"My brain was almost bewildered that night," she said; "I was so weary, so miserable; and yet, stay, I do remember the song. It was 'Auld Robin Gray.'"
"Yes, Honoria, the story of an old man's love for a woman young enough to be his daughter. I was sitting by my cheerless fire-side, meditating very gloomily upon the events of the day, which had been a sad one for me, when your thrilling tones stole upon my ear, and roused me from my reverie. I listened to every note of that old ballad. Although those words had long been familiar to me, they seemed new and strange that night. An irresistible impulse led me to the spot where you had sunk down in your helplessness. From that hour to this you have been the ruling influence of my life. I have loved you with a devotion which few men have power to feel. Tell me, Honoria, have I loved in vain? The happiness of my life trembles in the balance. It is for you to decide whether my existence henceforward is to be worthless to me, or whether I am to be the proudest and happiest of men."
"Would my love make you happy, Sir Oswald?"