Chapter 14 - Page 2

room with hurried steps; at length he replied:

"There is much, perhaps, to be said in explanation, that you do not
know. I left the country, because I found in it nothing but oppression
and injustice, and I could not invite you to become the bride of a
wanderer, without either name or fortune. But I have now the opportunity
of proving my truth. You say you are alone; be so no longer, and try how
far you were mistaken in believing that I should one day supply the
place to you of both father and mother."

There is something soothing to a female ear in the offer of even
protracted justice, and Alice spoke with less of acrimony in her tones,
during the remainder of their conference, if not with less of severity
in her language.

"You talk not like a man whose very life hangs but on a thread that the
next minute may snap asunder. Whither would you lead me? Is it to the
Tower at London?"

"Think not that I have weakly exposed my person without a sufficient
protection," returned the stranger with cool indifference; "there are
many gallant men who only wait my signal, to crush the paltry force of
this officer like a worm beneath my feet."

"Then has the conjecture of Colonel Howard been true I and the manner in
which the enemy's vessels have passed the shoals is no longer a mystery!
you have been their pilot!"

"I have."

"What! would ye pervert the knowledge gained in the springtime of your
guileless youth to the foul purpose of bringing desolation to the doors
of those you once knew and respected! John! John! is the image of the
maiden whom in her morning of beauty and simplicity I believe you did
love, so faintly impressed, that it cannot soften your hard heart to the
misery of those among whom she has been born, and who compose her little
world?"

"Not a hair of theirs shall be touched, not a thatch shall blaze, nor
shall a sleepless night befall the vilest among them--and all for your
sake, Alice! England comes to this contest with a seared conscience, and
bloody hands, but all shall be forgotten for the present, when both
opportunity and power offer to make her feel our vengeance, even in her
vitals. I came on no such errand."

"What, then, has led you blindly into snares, where all your boasted aid
would avail you nothing? for, should I call aloud your name, even here,
in the dark and dreary passages of this obscure edifice, the cry would
echo through the country ere the morning, and a whole people would be
found in arms to punish your audacity."

"My name has been sounded, and that in no gentle strains," returned the
Pilot, scornfully, "when a whole people