never betrothed, and now I hear she is to be married to Captain Rawdon, the nephew of my Lord Conway. I would have married Helen Graham in her smock if need be, though I say again I craved that title, and I would have been a faithful husband to her. But I have never loved her, nor any other woman before. Love, Jean"--he went on, and they both unconsciously had seated themselves a little apart--"is like the wind spoken of in the Holy Gospel. It bloweth where it listeth, and is not to be explained by reasons. In my coming and going to Court I have seen many fair women, and some of them have smiled on me and tried to take me by the lure of their eyes, but none has ever been so bonnie to me as you, Jean, and your hair of burnished gold. Doubtless I have met holier women than you, though my way has not lain much among the saints, but though one should show me a hundred faults in you, ye are to me to-day the best, and I declare if ye had sinned I would love you for your sins only less than for your virtues. I love you as a man should love a woman: altogether, your fair body from the crown of your head to the sole of your foot, your hair, your eyes, your mouth, your hands, the way you hold your head, the way you walk, your white teeth when you smile, and the dimple on your cheek.
Yourself, too, the Jean within that body, with your courage, your pride, your scorn, your temper, your fierce desires, your fiery jealousies, your changing moods. And your passion, with its demands, with its surrenders, with its caresses, with its pain. You, Jean Cochrane, as you are and as you shall be, with all my heart and with all my body, with all my loyalty, next to that I give my king, I love you, Jean." He leaned towards her as he spoke, and all the passion that was hidden behind his girl face and Court manner--the passion that had made him the most daring of soldiers, and was to make him the most successful of leaders--poured from his eyes, from his lips, from his whole self, like a hot stream, enveloping, overwhelming and captivating her. Strong as she was in will and character, she could not speak nor move, but only looked at him, with eyes wide open, from the midst of the wealth of her golden hair.
"Do I not know the sacrifice I am asking if you should consent to be my wife? Jean, I will tell you true: not for my love even and your bonnie self will I lie or palter with my faith. You will have to come to me, I will not go to you; you will have to break with the Covenant, leave your father's house and face your mother's anger, and be denounced by the godly, up and down the land, because ye married the man of blood and the persecutor of the saints. I will not change, ye understand that? No, not for the warm, soft clasp of your white arms round my neck; no, not though ye tie me with the meshes of your shining hair. I judge that ye will not be a temptress, but I give you warning I am no Sampson, in his weakness to a woman's witchery, when it comes to my faith and my duty. I will love you night and day as a man loveth a woman, but I will do what I am told to do, even though it be against your own people, till the evil days be over. And it may be, Jean, that I shall have to lead a hopeless cause. Ye must be willing to give me to death without a grudge, and send me with a kiss to serve the king.
"Can you do this"--and now his voice sank almost to a whisper, and he stretched his hands towards her--"for the sake of love, for love's sake only, for the sight of my face, for the touch of my lips, for the clasp of my arms, for the service of my heart, for myself? If ye should, I will be a true man to you, Jean, till death us do part. I have not been better than other men, but women have never made me play the fool, and even your own