“What a sad vanity!” exclaimed Lady Laura.  “On such a man no reliance can be placed.  But his plain declaration, a few minutes ago, is quite sufficient to mark his character, I mean his declaration, that he considers no vows taken to a woman at all binding on a man.  Is that the principle of an honourable heart, Mr. Brown?”

Wilton was silent for a moment, but Lady Laura evidently looked for a reply; and he answered at length, “No, it is not, Lady Laura; but I fully believe, ere taking any such vows, Sherbrooke would openly acknowledge his view of them, and, having done so, would look upon them as mere empty air.”

Lady Laura laughed, evidently applying her companion’s words to her own situation with Lord Sherbrooke; and Wilton, unwilling that one word from his lips should have a tendency to thwart the purposes of the Earl of Byerdale, in a matter where he had no right to interfere, hastened to add, “Let me assure you, Lady Laura, however, at the same time that I make this acknowledgment with regard to Sherbrooke, that I am fully convinced, if he were to pledge his word of honour to keep those voles, he would die rather than violate that pledge.”

“That is to say,” replied Lady Laura, somewhat bitterly, “that he has erected an idol whose oracles he can interpret as he will, and calls it honour, denying that there is any other God.  But let us speak of it no more, Mr. Brown; these things make one sad.”

Wilton was glad to speak of something else; for he felt himself bound by every tie to say all that he could in favour of Lord Sherbrooke; and yet he could not find in his heart to aid, in the slightest degree, in forwarding a scheme which could end in nothing but misery to the sweet and innocent girl beside him.  He changed the topic at once, then, and exerted himself to draw her mind away from the matter on which they had just been speaking.

Nevertheless, that subject, while they went on, remained in the mind of each; and Lady Laura might have discovered—­if she had been at all apprehensive of her own feelings—­that it is a dangerous thing to do as she had done, and raise, for any eye, even a corner of that veil which bides the heart, unless we are inclined to raise it altogether.  Her subsequent conversation with Wilton took its tone throughout, entirely from what had gone before.  Without knowing it, or rather, we should say, without perceiving it, they suffered it to be mingled with deep feelings; shadowed forth, perhaps, more than actually expressed.  A softness, too, came over it—­we insist not, though, perhaps, we might, call it a tenderness the ceremonious terms were soon dropped; and because the speakers would have been obliged to use those ceremonious terms, if they had spoken each other’s names, they seemed by mutual consent to forget each other’s names, and never spoke them at all.  Lady Laura did not address him as Mr. Brown, and Wilton uttered not the words, “Lady Laura.”  From time to time, too, she gazed up in his face, to see if he understood what she meant but could not fully express; and he, while he poured forth any of the deep thoughts long treasured in his own bosom, looked often earnestly into her countenance, to discover by the expression the effect produced on her mind.