"Lady Helen," returned he, "was it other than Wallace you sought in
these dungeons? I dared to think that the Parent we both adore had
sent you hither to be His harbinger of consolation!" Recalled to
self-possession by the kindness of these words, Helen turned her head
on his bosom, and in a burst of grateful tears, hardly articulated:
"And will you not abhor me for this act of madness? But I was not
myself. And yet, where should I live but at the feet of my benefactor?"
The steadfast soul of Wallace was subdued by this language, and the
manner of its utterance. It was the disinterested dictates of a pure
though agitated spirit, which he now was convinced did most exclusively
love him, but with the passion of an angel; and the tears of a sympathy
which spoke their kindred natures stole from his eyes as he bent his
cheek on her head. She felt them; and rejoicing in such an assurance
that she yet possessed his esteem, a blessed calm diffused itself over
her mind, and raising herself, with a look of virtuous confidence, she
exclaimed:
"Then you do understand me, Wallace? you pardon me this apparent
forgetfulness of my sex; and you recognize a true sister in Helen Mar?
I may administer to that noble heart, till--" she paused, turning
deathly pale, and then clasping his hand in both hers, in bitter agony
added, "till we meet in heaven!"
"And blissful, dearest saint, will be our union there," replied he,
"where soul meets soul, unencumbered of these earthly fetters; and
mingles with each other, even as thy tender teardrops now glide into
mine! But there, my Helen, we shall never weep.
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