deed. But I suppose you don't want me to do that now? Why don't you answer me? Why don't you say something? Are you drunk, sir, as they pretend? or are you asleep? O, I can't speak any plainer: this is intolerable. Mr. Gaunt, I'm going to shut the window."
Griffith got alarmed, and it sharpened his wits. "Kate, Kate!" he cried, "what do you mean? am I in a dream? would you marry poor me after all?"
"How on earth can I tell, till I am asked?" inquired Kate, with an air of childlike innocence, and inspecting the stars attentively.
"Kate, will you marry me?" said Griffith, all in a flutter.
"Of course I will—if you will let me," replied Kate, coolly, but rather tenderly, too.
Griffith burst into raptures. Kate listened to them with a complacent smile, then delivered herself after this fashion: "You have very little to thank me for, dear Griffith. I don't exactly downright love you, but I could not rob you of those unlucky farms, and you refuse to take them back any way but this; so what can I do? And then, for all I don't love you, I find I am always unhappy if you are unhappy, and happy when you are happy; so it comes pretty much to the same thing. I declare I am sick of giving you pain, and a little sick of crying in consequence. There, I have cried more in the last fortnight than in all my life before, and you know nothing spoils one's beauty like crying. And then you are so good, and kind, and true, and brave; and everybody is so unjust and so unkind to you, papa and all. You were quite in the right about the duel, dear. He is an impudent puppy; and I threw dust in your eyes, and made you own you were in the wrong, and it was a great shame of me, but it was because I liked you best. I could take liberties with you, dear. And you are wounded for me, and now I have disinherited you. O, I can't bear it, and I won't. My heart yearns for you,—bleeds for you. I would rather die than you should be unhappy; I would rather follow you in rags round the world than marry a prince and make you wretched. Yes, dear, I am yours. Make me your wife; and then some day I dare say I shall love you as I ought."
She had never showed her heart to him like this before; and now it overpowered him. So, being also a little under vinous influence, he stammered out something, and then fairly blubbered for joy. Then what does Kate do, but cry for company?
Presently, to her surprise, he was half-way up the turret, coming to her.
"O, take care! take care!" she cried. "You'll break your neck."
"Nay," cried he; "I must come at you, if I die for it."
The turret was ornamented from top to bottom with short ledges consisting of half-bricks. This ledge, shallow as it was, gave a slight foothold, insufficient in itself; but he grasped the strong branches of the ivy with a powerful hand, and so between the two contrived to get up and hang himself out close to her.
"Sweet mistress," said he, "put out your hand to me; for I can't take it against your will this time. I have got but one arm."
But this she declined. "No, no," said she; "you do nothing but torment and terrify me,—there." And so gave it him; and he mumbled it.
This last feat won her quite. She thought no other man could have got to her there with two arms; and Griffith had done it with one. She said to herself, "How he loves me!—more than his own neck." And then she thought, "I shall be wife to a strong man; that is one comfort."
In this softened mood she asked him demurely, would he take a friend's advice.
"If that friend is you, ay."
"Then," said she, "I'll do a downright brazen thing, now my hand is in. I declare I'll tell you how to secure me. You make me plight my troth with you this minute, and exchange rings with
