Gloucester, with a look of kind farewell, withdrew with the priest.
"Thou noble daughter of the noblest Scot!" said Wallace, raising her
from the ground, "this bosom is thy place, and not my feet. Long it
will not be given me to hold thee here; but even in the hours of years
of our separation my spirit will hover near thee, to bear thine to our
everlasting home."
The heart of Helen alternatively beat violently, and stopped, as if the
vital current were suddenly impeded. Hope and fear agitated her by
turns; but clinging to the flattering ideas which the arrival of the
embassadors had excited, she timidly breathed a hope that, by the
present interferences of King Philip, Edward might not be found
inexorable.
"Disturb not the holy composure of your soul by such an expectation,"
returned Wallace; "I know my adversary too well to anticipate his
relinquishing the object of his vengeance but at a price more infamous
than the most ignoble death. Therefore, best beloved of all on earth!
look for no deliverance for thy Wallace but what passes through the
grave; and to me, dearest Helen, its gates are on golden hinges
turning; for all is light and bliss which shines on me from within
their courts!"
Helen's thoughts, in the idea of his being torn from her, could not
wrest themselves from the dire images of his execution; she shuddered,
and in faltering accents replied, "Ah! could we glide from sleep into
so blessed a death, I would hail it even for thee! But the threatened
horrors, should they fall on thy sacred head, will in that hour, I
trust, also divorce my soul from this grievous world!"
"Not so, my Helen," returned he, "keep not thy dear eyes forever fixed
on the gloomy appendages of death.
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