“I have saved your life—­I hindered the gun from going off—­all I ask you in return is to spare my father.”  She still retained her hold on the old man’s arm, who, however, no longer struggled to get it free.

“What! you turned against me?” he said, looking ferociously at the beautiful imploring face of his daughter.  “You, to revenge whom I did it all!  Do you know what I did?  I watched your silken wooer till I saw him in the presence of this youth—­I killed Sir Stratford Manvers”——­

“And shall die for your crime,” cried Berville; “but the death of a felon is what you deserve, and you shall have none other at my hands.  In the mean time, as I think you are no fit companion for the young woman to whom I am indebted for my life, I shall offer her the protection of my mother, and take her from your house.  If you consent to let us go in peace, I spare your life for the present; and will even for three days abstain from setting the emissaries of the law in search of you.  After that, I will hunt you to the death.  Young woman, do you accept my terms?  If you refuse, your father dies before your face.”

     “Shall I accept, father?”

     “If you stay, I lodge a bullet in your brain,” said the old
     savage, and drew himself up.

“Come, then,” said Berville, leading Janet to the door.  She turned round ere she quitted the cottage, but met a glance of such anger and threatening, that she hurried forward with Berville, who pursued his way rapidly through the wood.”

["That fits in very nicely,” said Jack Stuart; “and you may be getting ready the five pound note, for I feel sure you know you back the losing horse.  Can any thing be more like a genuine, bona fide novel, the work of one man, and a devilish clever man too?  Confess now, that if you didn’t know the trick of it, you would have thought it a splendid original work?  But perhaps you’re throat’s dry with so much reading?  Here’s another bottle of Lafitte; and we can miss over a volume and a half of foreign scenes, which you can imagine; for they are to be found in every one of the forty novels I sent for.  Just imagine that the Countess takes her daughters abroad—­that Berville encounters them in the Colosseum by moonlight—­quarrels—­doubts—­suspicions—­and a reconciliation; finally, they all come home, and you will find the last chapter of the last volume in this.”

Jack handed me a volume, evidently popular among circulating library students, for it was very dirty; and I was just going to commence when Jack interrupted me.

“Stay,” he said; “you must have a motto.  Do you know Italian?”

“Not a word.”

“Or Spanish, or German?”

“No.”

“Well, you surely can recollect some Greek—­for next to manuscript quotations and old plays, you can’t do better than have some foreign lines at the beginning of the chapter.  What Greek do you remember?—­for, ’pon my honour; I’ve forgotten all mine.”