“Your wife! monster;—­never!” shrieked the unhappy girl, again vainly attempting to disengage herself from the encircling arm of the savage.  “But,” she pursued, in a tone of supplication, while the tears coursed each other down her cheek, “if you ever loved my mother as you say you have, restore her children to their home; and, if saints may be permitted to look down from heaven in approval of the acts of men, she whom you have loved will bless you for the deed.”

A deep groan burst from the vast chest of Wacousta; but, for a moment, he answered not.  At length he observed, pointing at the same time with his finger towards the cloudless vault above their heads,—­“Do you behold yon blue sky, Clara de Haldimar?”

“I do;—­what mean you?” demanded the trembling girl, in whom a momentary hope had been excited by the subdued manner of the savage.

“Nothing,” he coolly rejoined; “only that were your mother to appear there at this moment, clad in all the attributes ascribed to angels, her prayer would not alter the destiny that awaits you.  Nay, nay; look not thus sorrowfully,” he pursued, as, in despite of her efforts to prevent him, he imprinted a burning kiss upon her lips.  “Even thus was I once wont to linger on the lips of your mother; but hers ever pouted to be pressed by mine; and not with tears, but with sunniest smiles, did she court them.”  He paused; bent his head over the face of the shuddering girl; and gazing fixedly for a few minutes on her countenance, while he pressed her struggling form more closely to his own, exultingly pursued, as if to himself, —­“Even as her mother was, so is she.  Ye powers of hell! who would have ever thought a time would come when both my vengeance and my love would be gratified to the utmost?  How strange it never should have occurred to me he had a daughter!”

“What mean you, fierce, unpitying man?” exclaimed the terrified Clara, to whom a full sense of the horror of her position had lent unusual energy of character.  “Surely you will not detain a poor defenceless woman in your hands,—­the child of her you say you have loved.  But it is false!—­you never knew her, or you would not now reject my prayer.”

“Never knew her!” fiercely repeated Wacousta.  Again he paused.  “Would I had never known her! and I should not now be the outcast wretch I am,” he added, slowly and impressively.  Then once more elevating his voice,—­“Clara de Haldimar, I have loved your mother as man never loved woman; and I have hated your father” (grinding his teeth with fury as he spoke) “as man never hated man.  That love, that hatred are unquenched—­unquenchable.  Before me I see at once the image of her who, even in death, has lived enshrined in my heart, and the child of him who is my bitterest foe.  Clara de Haldimar, do you understand me now?”

“Almighty Providence! is there no one to save me?—­can nothing touch your stubborn heart?” exclaimed the affrighted girl; and she turned her swimming eyes on those of the warrior, in appeal; but his glance caused her own to sink in confusion.  “Ellen Halloway,” she pursued, after a moment’s pause, and in the wild accents of despair, “if you are indeed the wife of this man, as you say you are, oh! plead for me with him; and in the name of that kindness, which I once extended to yourself, prevail on him to restore me to my father!”