Sir William Wallace will never love woman
more; and even to name the idea seems an offense against the sacredness
of his sorrow."
"Blame me not, Helen," returned Lady Ruthven, "that I forgot
probability, in grasping at possibility which might give me such a
nephew as Sir William Wallace, and you a husband worthy of your merits!
I had always, in my own mind, fixed on the unknown knight for your
future lord; and now that I find that he and the deliverer of Scotland
are one, I am not to be looked grave at for wishing to reward him with
the most precious heart that ever beat in a female breast."
"No more of this, if you love me, my dear aunt!" returned Helen; "it
neither can nor ought to be. I revere the memory of Lady Marion too
much not to be agitated by the subject; so, no more!"-she was agitated.
But at that instant Edwin throwing open the door, put an end to the
conversation.
He came to apprise his mother that Sir William Wallace was in the state
apartments, come purposely to pay his respects to her, not having even
been introduced to her when the sudden illness of her niece in the
castle had made them part so abruptly.
"I will not interrupt his introduction now," said Helen, with a faint
smile; "a few days' retirement will strengthen me, and then I shall see
our protector as I ought.
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