She withdrew her hands from her face and, clasping them,
looked up. "Marion will indeed echo all my prayers, and He who reads
my heart will, I trust, grant them. They are for your life, Sir
William Wallace," added she, turning to him with agitation, "for it is
menaced."
"I will inquire by whom," answered he, "when I have first paid my duty
at this altar for guarding it so long. And dare I, daughter of
goodness, to ask you to unite the voice of your daughter of goodness,
to ask you to unite the voice of your gentle spirit with the secret one
of mine? I would beseech Heaven for pardon on my own transgressions; I
would ask of its mercy to establish the liberty of Scotland. Pray with
me, Lady Helen, and the invocations our souls utter will meet the
promise of Him who said: 'Where two or three are joined together in
prayer, there am I in the midst of them.'"
Helen looked on him with a holy smile; and pressing the crucifix which
she held to her lips, bowed her head on it in mute assent. Wallace
threw himself prostrate on the steps of the altar; and the fervor of
his sighs alone breathed to his companion the deep devotion of his
soul.
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