"Indeed!" said Emily, her emotions destroying the appearance of surprise the word was intended to convey.
"Emily, I will not now attempt to conceal the feelings which have torn my heart," said Henry, in a low tone, as he took her willing hand. "When I bade you farewell,—alas! what misfortunes have come since!—when I left you for I dared not think how long, you know not what violence I did to the warmest feeling of my heart. You know not what misery the struggle between that feeling and duty has caused me. I have striven to conquer it; but Heaven has now put you in my path, thus bidding me resist no more the impulse of my heart. I love you, Emily, and I have tried, for your sake and your father's, to conquer my love. Say, Emily, may I venture to hope my love is not unvalued?"
A slight pressure of the hand he held was all the answer he received—was, indeed, all he asked.
"You forget what I am," murmured Emily.
"I will always forget what this will has said you are. But Heaven will not let the innocent be wronged, nor the guilty remain unpunished. A month since, how I wished you were not the heiress of a millionaire!"
"Why did you wish it? Did you think that gold would blacken my heart?"
"No, dear Emily, but it would have been ingratitude in me to win your love, and thus destroy any other plan your father might have cherished."
"My father never had an avaricious disposition," replied Emily, warmly.
"Far from it; but he might have had some views, in regard to his daughter, with which I might have interfered."
"But you were a rebel against his views, notwithstanding," said Emily, with a smile, and a deep blush, which the darkness concealed from Henry.