Helen could not speak, but she wept her thanks on her father’s neck; then, suddenly recollecting where she was, she wiped away the mingled tears that hung upon her fair cheek, and timidly presented the Parliamentary Commissioner to Lady Alice, as her father.

Lady Alice coldly and distantly acknowledged the profound obeisance of the disconcerted Milbourne; who was advancing with eager alacrity to salute her ladyship, when a single glance from her large majestic eyes had the effect of paralysing his motions, and silencing the compliments he was preparing to utter.

At that moment—that critical moment, and before the ungracious words which hung on the haughty lips of Lady Alice could be pronounced, the rapid sound of a horseman, riding as if on life and death, was heard crossing the drawbridge of the Castle; and the next moment, Colonel Dagworth, with the red stains of recent battle on his array, and mired from spur to plume, rushed into the apartment.

“Mother!—sweet Helen!” he exclaimed, “I have been successful—joy with me—I am the happiest of men!”

“What now?” replied Lady Alice, haughtily rising from her seat; “what mean these stains upon your dress, Colonel Dagworth—are you wounded?”

“Nothing but a scratch not worth the caring for,” he replied, “the loss of the precious minutes was all my uneasiness; and for the first time in my life I would rather not have done battle with the Roundheads, had I not been intercepted by an ambuscade of them about five miles off. I should have been with you three hours earlier, but they compelled me to tarry by the way till I had beaten them soundly, mother mine; and now, I am come to tell you the good news of that, and the still better intelligence, that I have obtained my father’s full and free consent to take this lady to wife.”

“Your father’s consent!” echoed Lady Alice; “impossible! he would never so far forget himself.”

“It is here under his own hand and seal, nevertheless,” replied Colonel Dagworth, presenting his mother with a paper.

She received it with a compressed brow, read it with evident displeasure, and when she had concluded it, rent it into a thousand pieces, and scornfully setting her foot on the fragments, passionately exclaimed:

“Thus do I trample on the record of Sir Reginald Dagworth’s weakness, and the base preliminary for an alliance with the blood of traitors—”

“And on the happiness of your only son, madam,” retorted Colonel Dagworth bitterly, concluding the sentence; “of him whom you say you love, but the deadliest offices of hatred are kindness in comparison to the deliberate cruelty of conduct like yours.”

“Helen,” said the mortified parent to his daughter, who stood like one stunned and paralysed by this unexpected ebullition of Lady Alice’s hostile feelings, “it is enough; I thought the sacrifice had been on our part, when I consented to bestow you and the uncounted thousands to which you are the sole heiress, on the penniless son of an impoverished family, and an adherent to a ruined cause withal; but you have been rejected, my girl, with contumely, which ought to teach you the folly of desiring such unequal yoking; and now, Helen, return your thanks to this proud lady for the ungracious benefits she has conferred upon you, and let us begone from these walls for ever.”

“Stay, Master Milbourne, for pity’s sake.—Helen, will you thus abandon me?” exclaimed Colonel Dagworth. “My mother,” added he, “must and shall apologise for her conduct; it is the warmth of party feeling, nothing else, believe me, and you must forgive her.”

“Lady Alice is your mother, Edward Dagworth,” said Helen, “and from her I can forgive anything—even her assurance that I am unworthy of the honour of becoming your wife.”