“Malcolm, have I brought you here, too?  Why are you in irons?  It seems that I am destined to bring calamity upon all whom I love.”

“It is a long story,” I replied laughingly.  “I will tell it to you when the time begins to drag; but I tell you now it is through no fault of yours that I am here.  No one is to blame for my misfortune but myself.”  Then I continued bitterly, “Unless it be the good God who created me a fool.”

John went to his father’s side and said:—­

“Sir Malcolm is here, father.  Will you not rise and greet him?”

John’s voice aroused his father, and the old lord came to the little patch of light in which I was standing and said:  “A terrible evil has fallen upon us, Sir Malcolm, and without our fault.  I grieve to learn that you also are entangled in the web.  The future looks very dark.”

“Cheer up, father,” said John, taking the old man’s hand.  “Light will soon come; I am sure it will.”

“I have tried all my life to be a just man,” said Lord Rutland.  “I have failed at times, I fear, but I have tried.  That is all any man can do.  I pray that God in His mercy will soon send light to you, John, whatever of darkness there may be in store for me.”

I thought, “He will surely answer this just man’s prayer,” and almost before the thought was completed the dungeon door turned upon its hinges and a great light came with glorious refulgence through the open portal—­Dorothy.

“John!”

Never before did one word express so much of mingled joy and grief.  Fear and confidence, and, greater than all, love unutterable were blended in its eloquent tones.  She sprang to John as the lightning leaps from cloud to cloud, and he caught her to his heart.  He gently kissed her hair, her face being hidden in the folds of his doublet.

“Let me kneel, John, let me kneel,” she murmured.

“No, Dorothy, no,” he responded, holding her closely in his arms.

“But one moment, John,” she pleased.

“No, no; let me see your eyes, sweet one,” said John, trying to turn her face upward toward his own.

“I cannot yet, John, I cannot.  Please let me kneel for one little moment at your feet.”

John saw that the girl would find relief in self-abasement, so he relaxed his arms, and she sank to her knees upon the dungeon floor.  She wept softly for a moment, and then throwing back her head with her old impulsive manner looked up into his face.

“Oh, forgive me, John!  Forgive me!  Not that I deserve your forgiveness, but because you pity me.”

“I forgave you long ago, Dorothy.  You had my full forgiveness before you asked it.”

He lifted the weeping girl to her feet and the two clung together in silence.  After a pause Dorothy spoke:—­

“You have not asked me, John, why I betrayed you.”

“I want to know nothing, Dorothy, save that you love me.”