"
"Edwin!" cired she, at last summoning power to speak, for during the
latter part of this address she had sat gasping from unutterable
disappointment and rage; "are you not afraid to breathe all this to me?
I have given you my confidence and do you abuse it? Do you stab me,
when I ask you to heal?"
"No, my dear aunt," replied he; "I speak the truth to you, ungrateful
as it is, to prevent you hearing it in perhaps a more painful form from
Wallace himself."
"Oh, no!" cried she, with contemptuous haughtiness; "he is a man, and
he knows how to pardon the excesses of love! Look around you, foolish
boy, and see how many of our proudest lords have united their fates
with women who not only loved them while their husbands lived, but left
their homes and children to join their lovers! And what is there in
me, a princess of the crowns of Scotland and of Norway-a woman who has
had the nobles of both kingdoms at her feet, and frowned upon them
all-that I should now be contemned? Is the ingrate for whom alone I
ever felt a wish of love-is he to despise me for my passion? You
mistake, Edwin; you know not the heart of man."
"Not of the common race of men, perhaps," replied he; "but certainly
that of Sir William Wallace.
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