Won from the Waves

by William Henry Giles Kingston

“Why so?” asked Harry.

May looked up in his face but did not answer.

“Do you fancy they can do otherwise than admire you, and think you all that is sweet, and charming, and excellent, and loveable as I do, May,” and he took her hand which she did not withdraw, though her eyes were cast down, and the blush deepened on her cheeks. “Oh, May, I did not intend to say so much, but I had resolved to tear myself from you unless I could hope that you were not indifferent to me.”

“Harry,” said May, trying to calm her agitation; she had always before called him Mr Harry, “I was thinking of your mother’s proposed visit, and afraid lest she should believe that I was the cause of your frequent visits to Downside. Knowing, as I do, the pride of your family, I feared that you might be induced to give up your visits here; and oh, Harry, that we might be parted.”

“No, no, May,” exclaimed Harry, letting all his sober resolutions fly to the wind, and pressing more lovingly her hand. “My parents, even should they wish to do so, have no right to insist on my giving up one against whom they cannot allege a single fault. The circumstance of your birth ought not to be an impediment, and believe me, May, with all the desire I possess to be an obedient son, I could not be influenced by such a reason. I do not invite you to share poverty with me, for I have already an ample income to support a wife, and as I need not ask my father for a single shilling, I do not think he will have any just reason to oppose my wishes.”

“Harry,” said May, “I own I love you, but I must not run any risk of creating dissension between you and your parents. That and that alone can prevent me from giving you my hand as you already have my heart. I have been told of a sad history of a member of your own family, your father’s brother, who, against his parent’s wishes, married a young lady to whom they objected on account of her birth, and he was banished from his home ever afterwards, living an exile in foreign lands. I should fear that your father and mother would look upon me as an unfit match for you, and discard you, should you persist in marrying me.”

“You speak of my uncle Ronald,” exclaimed Harry, “who married, I am told, a very lovely girl, and simply because she could not trace her pedigree to the same stock as the Castletons, my grandfather refused to receive her as his daughter-in-law, and my uncle, rather than subject her to the annoyance to which she might have been exposed at home, took her abroad. Surely my father, after he has seen the consequence of the harsh treatment his brother received, would not behave in the same way to me; besides, you know, he is my father’s eldest brother, and it is not at all certain that he is dead, so that he may some day return and claim the baronetcy and Texford, and if so, I shall be but a younger brother’s youngest son, and no one need trouble their heads who I marry. But, my dear May, if I wore a ducal coronet, you would be the richest prize I could wish for to grace it; though do not suppose, though I would rather, for the sake of avoiding difficulties, be of the humblest birth, that I consider you unworthy of filling the highest rank in the realm.”

May had never told Harry that she was not Dame Halliburt’s daughter. Why she had not done so she might even have found it difficult to say. At first, a feeling of modest reserve had prevented her from speaking about herself. The Miss Pembertons, in their simplicity, had not thought it likely that Harry would fall in love with her, merely by coming a few times to the house, if he supposed her to be Adam Halliburt’s daughter; but they had sufficient worldly wisdom to know that should they excite his interest by telling him her romantic history, he, in all probability, would be moved by it. May herself, however, now felt she ought not longer to conceal the fact from him. It could not fail to be a satisfaction to him, as both the ladies and her foster-parents were fully convinced that she was of gentle birth. She was on the point of telling him when Susan hurried up with the information that Lady Castleton’s carriage had just driven to the door.

The young people had not marked how rapidly the time had gone by.

May suddenly felt even more agitated than before. Harry’s declaration, though delightful, was not calculated to prepare her for receiving his mother and sister with the self-possession and calmness she would have wished to exhibit.