"So I suppose," replied Sir William. "You made love to her, Arthur Bohun. You would have married her, I believe, but that I stopped it."
"You--stopped it!" exclaimed Arthur, at sea: for he had known nothing of the letter received by Ellen.
"I wrote to Ellen, telling her I must forbid her to marry you. I feared at the time of writing that the interdict might arrive too late. But it seems that it did not do so."
"Yes," abstractedly returned Arthur, letting pass what he did not understand.
"You see, I had been thinking of you always as belonging to her--your mother--more than to him. That mistake is over. I shall value you now as his son; more I dare say than I shall ever value any other young man in this world."
Arthur's breath came fast and thick. "Then--you--you would give her to me, sir!"
Sir William shook his head in sadness. Arthur misunderstood the meaning.
"The probability is, sir, that I shall succeed my uncle in the baronetcy. Would it not satisfy you?"
"You can see her if you will," was Sir William's answer, but there was the same sad sort of denial in his manner. "I would not say No now for your father's sake. She is in the drawing-room, upstairs. I will join you as soon as I have written a note."
Arthur found his way by instinct. Ellen was lying back in an easy-chair; the brilliant light of the chandelier on her face. Opening the door softly, it--that face--was the first object that met his sight. And he started back in terror.