“And what if I am?” asked the girl hopelessly. “Would the knowledge that such were the case end this useless discussion?”
“No, by my salvation, it would not. If you admit but the slightest esteem for me, I will carry you to my castle in the North and hold it safe for you against the world. Are you, then, wedded?”
“I am wedded to deceit. Sir, I am not worthy your love, or that of any other honest man. If you knew what it costs me to say this, you would let these words be the last we speak in this painful debate.”
“Deceit? Not worthy of any honest man? Lord save you, child of sweet innocence, if this is all that troubles you, there is nothing in our way to the church. Your eyes are limpid wells of honesty. You could not harbour a deceitful thought if you tried. I would trust my life, my honour, my very soul to your keeping, assured that———”
“O God of mercy! why do you torture me?” cried the girl in a burst of anguish, bending her head over the horse’s mane. The astonished young man placed his hand affectionately on her shoulder, and felt her shudder beneath his touch.
“My dearest lass,” he began, but never finished the sentence.
“Halt!” came a sharp command. Armstrong looked up like a man awakening from a dream.
“‘Fore God!” he cried, wonder-stricken, “we’re on the outposts of Oxford.”
A ragged soldier barred the way, with musket held horizontally. An officer in a uniform that had once been gaudy, but now showed signs of hard usage, came out from the cabin at the side of the road when he heard the sentinel’s challenge. Though his costume was so threadbare, he carried it with a swagger that had almost a touch of insolence in it, but this bearing melted to a debonair deference when he saw a handsome young woman before him. He lifted his hat and addressed her companion.
“Pardon me. Have you the pass-word?”