You have made me dream the dreams of youth and high unsullied purpose once again.
Was it strange that in the dark pathways of the Court I watched your footsteps come and go, carrying radiance with you?
No--Leicester has learned how sombre, sinister, has been his past, by a presence which is the soul of beauty, of virtue, and of happy truth.

Lady, my heart is yours.

I worship you." Overborne for the moment by the eager, searching eloquence of his words, she had listened bewildered to him.

Now she turned upon him with panting breath and said: "My lord, my lord, I will hear no more.

You know I love Monsieur de la Foret, for whose sake I am here in England--for whose sake I still remain." "'Tis a labour of love but ill requited," he answered with suggestion in his tone.
"What mean you, my lord ?" she asked sharply, a kind of blind agony in her voice; for she felt his meaning, and though she did not believe him, and knew in her soul he slandered, there was a sting, for slander ever scorches where it touches.
"Can you not see ?" he said.