Once he shifted his whip to his left hand, and stretching out his right hand, looked at it curiously: it seemed to be still thrilling with the contact of her small, warm palm.

As he came up to The Woodman Inn he remembered, what he had forgotten in the morning, that he had left his cigar-case on the dining-room mantel-shelf. He pulled up, and giving Adonis to the hostler, who rushed forward promptly, he went into the inn. There was no one in the hall, and knowing that he should be late for luncheon, he opened the dining-room door and walked in, and straight up to the fireplace.

The cigar-case was where he had left it, and he turned to go out. Then he saw that he was not the only occupant of the room, for a lady was sitting in the broad bay-window. He snatched off his cap and murmured an apology.

"I beg your pardon! I did not know anyone was in the room," he said.

The lady was young and handsome, with a beauty which owed a great deal to colour. Her hair was a rich auburn, her complexion of the delicate purity which sometimes goes with that coloured hair—"milk and roses," it used to be called. Her eyes were of china blue, and her lips rather full, but of the richest carmine. She was exquisitely dressed, her travelling costume evidently of Redfern's build, and one hand, from which she had removed the glove, was loaded with costly rings; diamonds and emeralds as large as nuts, and of the first water.

But it was not her undeniable beauty, or her dress and costly jewellery, which impressed Stafford so much as the proud, scornfully listless air with which she regarded him as she leant back indolently—and a little insolently—tapping the edge of the table with her glove.

"Pray don't apologise," she said, languidly. "This is a public room, I suppose!"

"Yes, I think so," said Stafford, in his pleasant, frank way; "but one doesn't rush into a public room with one's hat on if he has reason to suppose that a lady is present. I thought there was no one here—the curtain concealed you: I am sorry."

She shrugged her shoulders and gave him the faintest and most condescending of bows; then, as he reached the door, she said:

"Do you think it will be moonlight to-night?"

Stafford naturally looked rather surprised at this point-blank meteorological question.

"I shouldn't be surprised if it were," he said. "You see, this is a very changeable climate, and as it is raining now it will probably clear up before the evening."

"Thanks!" she said. "I am much obliged—"

"Oh, my opinion isn't worth much," he put in parenthetically, but she went on as if he had not spoken.

—"I should be still further obliged if you would be so kind as to tell my father—he is outside with the carriage somewhere—that I am tired and that I would rather not go on until the cool of the evening."

"Certainly," said Stafford.

He waited a moment to see if she had any other requests, or rather orders, and then went out and found the gentleman with the strongly marked countenance, in the stable-yard beside the carriage to which the hostler and the help were putting fresh horses.

Stafford raised his hat slightly.

"I am the bearer of a message from the young lady in the dining-room, sir," he said. "She wishes me to tell you that she would prefer to remain here until the evening."

The man swung round upon him with an alert and curious manner, half startled, half resentful.

"What the devil—I beg your pardon! Prefers to remain here! Well!" He muttered something that sounded extremely like an oath, then, with a shrug of his shoulders, told the hostler to take the horses out. "Thank you!" he said to Stafford, grudgingly. "I suppose my daughter is tired: very kind of you."

"Not at all," responded Stafford, politely; and he got on to Adonis, which Mr. Groves himself had led out, and rode away.

The gentleman looked after him with knitted brows.

"What is the name of that young fellow?" he asked of Groves.

"That is Mr. Stafford Orme, Sir Stephen's son, sir," replied Groves.

The gentleman was walking towards the house, but he pulled up short, his eyes narrowed themselves to slits and his thick lips closed tightly.

"A fine young fellow, sir!" said Groves, with respectful enthusiasm. "A splendid specimen of an English gentleman!"

The gentleman grunted and went on to the dining-room.

"What whim is this, Maude?" he asked, irritably.

She yawned behind her beringed hand.

"I am tired. I can't face that stuffy carriage again just yet. Let us dine here and go on afterwards in the cool."

"Oh, just as you like," he said. "It makes no difference to me!"

"I know," she assented. Then, in an indolently casual way, she asked:

"Who was that gentleman who rode by just now?"

Her father glanced at her suspiciously as he took off his overcoat.

"Now, how on earth should I know, my dear Maude!" he replied, with a short, harsh laugh. "Some young farmer or cattle dealer, I imagine."

"I said gentleman," she retorted, with something approaching insolence. "You will permit me to know the difference."

Her father coloured angrily, as if she had stung him.

"You'd better go upstairs and take off your things while I order dinner," he said.



CHAPTER IX.

As Stafford rode homewards he wondered whom the strange pair could be. It was evident they were not going to stay at the Villa, or they would have driven straight there; but it was also evident that the gentleman had heard of Sir Stephen's "little place," or he would not have asked where it was; but, as Stafford reflected, rather ruefully, it would be difficult for any traveller passing through the neighbourhood not to see the new, great white house, or to hear something, perhaps a very great deal, of the man who had built it.

Howard sauntered down the hall to meet him.

"Good heavens, how wet you look, and, needless to add, how happy. If there is anything in the doctrine of the transmigration of souls, my dear Stafford, your future embodiment will be that of a Newfoundland dog. Such an extremely strong passion for cold water is almost—er—indecent. I've had a lovely morning in the library; and your father is still at work with his correspondence. I asked him what he thought of Lord Palmerston's aphorism: that if you left your letters unanswered long enough they answered themselves; and he admitted it was true, and that he had sometimes adopted the plan successfully. There is a secretary with him—a dark and silent man named Murray, who appears to have an automatic, double-action brain; anyway he can write a letter and answer questions at the same time. And he watches your father's lips as if he—the secretary, not Sir Stephen—were a dog waiting for a stone to be thrown. It is interesting to watch—for a time; then it gets on one's nerves. May I ask where you have been?"

"Oh, just for a ride; been trying the new horse: he's a clinker! The governor couldn't have got hold of a better if he'd searched all Arabia, and Hungary to boot. I'll just change and get some lunch. I hope you haven't waited?"

"Your hope is not in vain, young man," replied Howard, suavely; "but I will come and sit beside you while you stoke."

With Measom's aid Stafford was soon into dry clothes and seated at lunch, and, as he had promised, Howard drew a chair to the table, and contemplated him with vicarious enjoyment.

"What an appetite you have!" he drawled, admiringly. "I imagine it would stand by you, even if you were in love. As a specimen of the perfectly healthy animal you stand preeminent, my dear Stafford. By the way, shall I spoil your lunch if I read you out a list of the guests whom we are expecting this afternoon? Sir Stephen was good enough to furnish me with it, with the amiable wish that I might find some friend on it. What do you say to Lord and Lady Fitzharford; the Countess of Clansford; the Baron Wirsch; the Right Honourable Henry Efford; Sir William and Lady Plaistow—"

Stafford looked up and smiled.

"Any more?"

"Oh, yes. There are the two Beltons and George Levinson, to say nothing of Mr. Griffinberg, the railroad king."

Stafford stared at his claret glass.

"I wonder why the governor has asked such a crowd?" he said, musingly.

"A perfectly arranged symphony in colours, I call it," said Howard. "Fashion is represented by the Fitzharfords and old Lady Clansford; politics by Efford and the Beltons, and finance by Plaistow and Wirsch. That Griffinberg is coming is a proof that Sir Stephen has got 'a little railway' in his mind; there are several others who seem to have been thrown in, not to increase weight, but to lighten it. It will be rather amusing—a kind of menagerie which, under less skilful guidance than Sir Stephen's, might be sure to disagree and fight."

Stafford sighed.

"Oh, you'll be all right," he said; "but I don't quite see where I shall come in."

Howard laughed.

"My dear Stafford, there are some extremely pretty girls with whom you can flirt, and I've no doubt some of the men will join you in your eccentric attempts to drown yourself or break your neck. Is that the sun coming out, and is it going to clear?"

"I hope so," said Stafford, laughing. "For I prophesied a fine evening, and a lady was weak enough to take my word for it. Let us go and rake my father out of the library, and get him into the garden with a cigar."

"You may venture upon such an audacity, but not I," said Howard, with simulated fear. "I'll wait for you on the terrace."

Sir Stephen looked up with a frown as Stafford entered, and the dark-faced secretary stared aghast at the intrusion; but Sir Stephen's face cleared as he saw who it was.

"Back, Stafford?" he said. "What? Come into the garden—cigar? Certainly! You can finish up, can't you, Murray? Thanks!" He looked at his watch as they went through the hall. "I suppose some of the people will be here before long. Did Mr. Howard show you the list? Do you know any of them. Stafford?"

"Yes, I've met Lady Clansford and the Fitzharfords, of course; but most of them are too great and lofty. I mean that they are celebrated personages, out of my small track. One doesn't often meet Sir William Plaistow and Mr. Griffinberg at at homes and afternoon teas." Sir Stephen laughed.

"Oh, well, you mustn't let them bore you, you know, my boy. You must consider yourself quite free to cut off and amuse yourself some other way whenever you get tired of them."

"And leave it all to you, sir!" said Stafford, with a smile; but as he spoke he drew a breath of relief; he should be free to help the beautiful, lovely girl of Herondale.

A few hours later the visitors arrived, and before dinner the superb drawing-room was, if not crowded, sufficiently well filled with the brilliant company.

Nearly all the guests were extremely wealthy, most of them were powerful, either in the region of politics or finance; and the fashionable world was represented by some beautiful women with dresses and diamonds above reproach, and some young men whose names stood high at Hurlingham and Prinses.

Stafford stood beside his father as Sir Stephen went from group to group, greeting one and another in his frank and genial yet polished manner, which grew warm and marked by scarcely repressed pride, as he introduced Stafford.

"My son, Lady Fitzharford. I think he has had the pleasure of meeting you? I scarcely know who are his friends: we have been separated so long! But we are restored to each other at last, I am happy to say! Lady Clansford, you know my boy? Ah, he has had the advantage of me all these years; he has not had to rush all over Europe, but has been able to bask in the sunshine of grace and beauty. Griffinberg, I want my son to know you. You and I are such old friends that you won't mind me showing that I am proud of him, eh?" and he laid his hand on Stafford's shoulder with an air of pride and affection.

"What a lovely place Sir Stephen has made of this, Mr. Orme," said Lady Clansford; "we were quite startled as we drove up, and simply bewildered when we got inside. This room is really—oh well, I'm beggared for adjectives!"

Stafford went about, listening to the encomiums on his father or the house, and making appropriate responses; but he was rather relieved when the butler announced dinner.

The dining-room received its meed of praise from the guests, and the elaborate menu caused some of the men to beam with inward satisfaction. It was a superb dinner, served with a stateliness which could not have been exceeded if royalty had been amongst the guests. The plate was magnificent, the flowers arranged by an artist's hand, in rich and yet chaste abundance. Stafford, as he looked from the bottom of the table to Sir Stephen at the head, felt with a thrill of pride that his father was the most distinguished-looking man of them all; and he noticed that in the tone of both the men and the women who addressed him there was that subtle note which indicates respect and the consideration which men and women of the world pay to one who has achieved greatness.

And yet, he noticed also, that not one of them was more perfectly at his ease than Sir Stephen, who laughed and talked as if his only aim was that of enjoyment, and as if he had never "planned a plan or schemed a scheme." Every now and then Stafford caught his father's eye, and each time he did so, Sir Stephen smiled at him with that air of pride and affection which he made no attempt to conceal or check. Once or twice Howard, too, caught his eye and smiled significantly as if he were saying, "How is this for a successful party?"

The dinner went swimmingly, and when the ladies had retired Sir Stephen begged the men to close up, and passed the wine freely. The talk was of everything but politics or business—Stafford remarked that not a word was said of either topic; and Sir Stephen told one or two stories admirably and set the laughter going.

"What sort of a night is it, Stafford?" he asked, presently.

Stafford drew the curtain from the open French window, and the moonlight streamed in to fight with the electric lamps.

"Shall we go out on to the terrace?" said Sir Stephen. "Quite warm enough, isn't it?"

They went out; servants brought coffee and cigars, and some of the gentlemen sauntered up and down the terrace, and others went down into the garden. Sir Stephen linked his arm in Stafford's, and they walked a little apart along one of the smooth paths.

"Not bored, I hope, my boy?" he asked.

"Good gracious, no, sir!" replied Stafford. "I don't think I remember a more successful dinner. Why should I be bored?"

"That's all right!" said Sir Stephen, pressing his arm. "I was afraid you might be. They are not a bad set—the men, I mean—if you keep them off their hobbies; and we managed to do that, I think."

"Yes, I noticed you managed them very well, sir," said Stafford. "What a lovely night." They had reached a gate opening on to the road, and they stood and looked at the view in silence for a moment, listening to a nightingale, whose clear notes joined with the voices and laughter of the guests.

Suddenly another sound came upon the night air; a clatter of horses' hoofs and the rattle of wheels.

"Someone driving down the road," said Sir Stephen.

"And coming at a deuce of a pace!" said Stafford. He opened the gate and looked up the road; then he uttered an ejaculation.

"By George! they've bolted!" he said, in his quiet way.

"What?" asked Sir Stephen, as he, too, came out. The carriage was tearing down the hill towards them in the moonlight, and Stafford saw that the horses were rushing along with lowered heads and that the driver had lost all control of them.

As they came towards the two men, Stafford set off running towards them. Sir Stephen called him; Stafford took no heed, and as the horses came up to him he sprang at the head of the nearer one. There was a scramble, a scuffing of hoofs, and a loud, shrill shriek from the interior of the carriage; then the horses were forced on to their haunches, and Stafford scrambled to his feet from the road into which he had been hustled.

The driver jumped down and ran to the horses' heads, the carriage door was flung open and the gentleman of the inn leapt out. Leapt out almost on to Sir Stephen, who ran up breathless with apprehension on Stafford's account. The two men stood and looked at each other in the moonlight, at first with a confused and bewildered gaze, then Sir Stephen started back with a cry, a strange cry, which brought Stafford to his side.

At the same moment, the girl he had seen in the sitting-room at the inn, slipped out of the carriage.

"Are we safe?" she asked faintly. "How did we stop? Who—"

She stopped abruptly, and both she and Stafford stared at the two men who were standing confronting each other. Sir Stephen was as white as a ghost, and there was a look of absolute terror in his dark eyes. On the face of the other man was an enigmatical smile, which was more bitter than a sneer.

"You are all right?" said Stafford; "but I am afraid you were very much frightened!"

The girl turned to him. "You!" she said, recognising him. "Did you stop them?"

"Yes; it was easy: they had had almost enough," he said.

While they were speaking, the two elder men drew apart as if instinctively.

"You, Falconer?" murmured Sir Stephen, with ashy lips.

"Yes," assented the other, drily; "yes, I am here right enough. Which is it to be—friend or foe?"

Sir Stephen stood gnawing his lip for a moment, then he turned to Stafford.

"Stafford, this—most extraordinary—this is an old friend of mine. Falconer, this is my boy, my son Stafford!"



CHAPTER X.

"A very old friend of your father!" said Mr. Falconer, and his keen eyes looked into Stafford's as he held out his hand. Then he turned to Sir Stephen, whose face had resumed its usual serenity, and was fixed in the smile appropriate to the occasion. "Mr. Stafford Orme and I have met before to-day—"

Sir Stephen shot an enquiring glance from one to the other.

—"At the inn at the other side of the lake. My daughter, Maude, and I have been resting there for a few hours. Maude," he said to that young lady, who was standing looking on at the group generally, but more particularly, under her lids, at Stafford's tall figure; "this is a very strange meeting between old friends. Sir Stephen Orme and I haven't met for—how long ago is it, Orme?"

Sir Stephen shook his head, and raised his thick, dark brows.

"Too long for us to go back—especially in the presence of these young people, whom we are always trying to persuade that we are not old. I am delighted to see you, my dear young lady, and I am devoured by curiosity to know how it is that you are here."

"Well, we owe it to your son, Mr. Orme here, I should imagine, Sir Stephen," she replied. She had fully recovered her self-possession, and her manner and voice had all the tone of pride and indolence which Stafford had noticed when he met her at the inn. "If he had not stopped the horses, I suppose we should have either been killed or on the way to the nearest hospital. By the way, have you thanked Mr. Orme yet, father?"

"Not yet; and I shall find it difficult to do so," said Mr. Falconer. "Thanks are poor return for one's life, Mr. Orme. I hope you were not hurt." He glanced at Stafford's usually immaculate dress-clothes, which were covered with dust on one side, and displayed a rent in the sleeve of the coat.

"Oh, that's all right, sir," returned Stafford, with all an Englishman's dread of a fuss. "They stopped short the moment I got hold of them, and I only slipped, and got up directly.

"You are not hurt, then, Stafford?" said Sir Stephen. "As I came up I thought, was afraid that you were smashed up—and I daresay I showed my fear: it's my only boy, Falconer."

He looked at his old friend meaningly, and Falconer promptly backed him up.

"Well, yes, you looked fairly startled and scared," he said. "But now, if the horses are all right, we may as well get on. We have given you quite trouble enough."

"The horses are all right, sir," said the driver. "I've managed to take up the broken trace; it was that that startled them, sir, and they'll be quiet enough now."

"Oh, but where are you going?" said Sir Stephen, with hospitable eagerness. "Were you not coming to us, to the Villa?"

"No; we were going to Keswick," said Mr. Falconer. "My daughter had a fancy for seeing the lake district, and we are making a kind of tour."

"You have no other engagement? I am delighted to hear it," said Sir Stephen. "Oh, I'll take no denial! What! Do you think I shall part with an old friend so quickly—and after such a—er—sudden and unexpected meeting! Miss Falconer, let me beg you to plead with your father for me!"

Mr. Falconer regarded Sir Stephen for a moment curiously, then looked towards his daughter. Her fine eyes rested on Stafford's face, and he could do not less than repeat his father's invitation.

"I hope you'll consent, Miss Falconer," he said. "You have no doubt been a little upset by the accident, and it is rather late to go on. Pray stay with us!"

"Thanks. I shall be delighted." she said, with her indolent, regal air.

By this time, as they went towards the gate, some of the men who had been walking in the garden came up, and Howard's voice called out:

"Hallo, Stafford! Anything the matter?" "No; nothing whatever," said Stafford, promptly; and Sir Stephen seized the opportunity to steer the Falconers through the group. "Some old friends of mine, Mr. Howard; their carriage broke down—fortunately at our very door—this way, Falconer. Stafford, will you give Miss Maude your arm?"

"Strange, our meeting again so soon, and under such circumstances," she said. "You must have stopped those horses very pluckily. I thought that kind of thing was out of date now, and that gentlemen only called the police on such occasions. You are sure you are not hurt? I thought from your father's face you must be. He must be very fond of you to look so scared. He was as white as a ghost."

"He is fond of me, I hope and think," said Stafford. "Candidly, I did not think he would be so alarmed—but I don't know him very well yet—we have been living apart until just recently."

"Why, that is my case," she said. "My father and I were strangers until the other day, when he came from abroad—What a beautiful house! It is like a miniature palace."

She looked at the Villa and then at Stafford with renewed interest.

"I suppose your father is the Sir Stephen Orme of whom one has heard so much? I did not think of it until this moment."

Stafford was giving instructions that the Falconers' carriage should be seen to, and so was spared a reply. She stood in the hall looking round with a kind of indolent admiration and surprise, and perfectly self-possessed, though the hall was rapidly filling with the men from the garden.

"You would like to go to your rooms at once," said Sir Stephen, in his serene and courtly voice. "If you should be too tired to come down again to-night I will have some dinner sent up to you—but I hope you won't be. It would be a great disappointment."

"Oh, I am not at all tired," said Miss Falconer, as she followed the housekeeper and the two demure maids up the exquisite staircase.

Sir Stephen looked after them with a bland smile, then he turned to Stafford and caught his arm.

"Not hurt, my boy?" he said, in a tone of strained anxiety.

Stafford was beginning to get tired of the question, and answered rather impatiently: "Not in the least sir—why should I be! I'll change my things and be down in five minutes!"

"Yes, yes!" Sir Stephen still eyed him with barely concealed anxiety. "Strange coincidence, Stafford! I—I haven't seen Ralph Falconer for—for—ever so many years! And he is thrown at my very gate! And they say there is no such thing as Fate—"

"Hadn't you better go into the drawing-room, sir," Stafford reminded him. "They'll think something has happened."

"Eh? Yes, yes, of course!" said Sir Stephen, with a little start as if he had been lost in thought; but he waited until he saw Stafford walk up the stairs, without any sign of a limp, before he followed his son's advice.

The butler, who was too sharp to need any instructions, quickly served a choice little dinner for the unexpected guests, and Stafford, who had waited in the hall, accompanied them into the dining-room. Miss Falconer had changed her travelling-dress for a rich evening-frock, and the jewels Stafford had noticed were supplemented by some remarkably fine diamonds.

"I wish you had come in time for dinner!" he said, as he conducted her to her seat.

"So do I!" she returned, serenely. "We are giving a great deal of trouble; and we are keeping you from your guests. The maid who waited on me told me that you had a large house party."

"Yes," said Stafford. "It is a kind of house-warming. My father intends settling in England for some time, I think," he added. "And he has built this place."

Mr. Falconer looked up from his plate in his alert, watchful way.

"Sir Stephen's plans rather uncertain?" he said. "I remember he always used to be rather erratic. Well, if he means settling, he's made himself a very cosy nest." He looked round the magnificent room with a curious smile. "A wonderful man, your father, Mr. Orme!"

"Yes?" said Stafford, with a non-committal smile.

"Yes; of course, I've heard of his great doings—who hasn't! Did you ever hear him speak of me—we were great friends one time?"

"No, I don't think I have," replied Stafford. "But as I was telling Miss Falconer, I have not seen very much of him." "Ah, yes, just so," assented Mr. Falconer, and he went on with his dinner.

Stafford had taken a seat at the table and poured out a glass of wine so that they might not hurry; but he felt that he need not have been anxious on that account, for the girl ate her dinner in a most leisurely manner, talking to him in her soft, slow voice and looking at him from under her half-closed lids. She talked of the scenery, of the quaint inns and hotels they had put up at, of the various inconveniences which she had suffered on the way; then suddenly she raised her lids and looked at him fully and steadily.

"I suppose the young lady we saw with you this morning is your sister?"

With all his natural simplicity, Stafford was a man of the world, and he did not redden or look embarrassed by the suddenness of the question and the direct gaze of the luminous eyes.

"No," he said. "I have neither sister nor brother—only my father. She was a friend."

"Oh," she said; then after a pause: "She was very pretty."

Stafford nodded. Like a flash floated before him the exquisite loveliness of Ida Heron.

"Do you think so?" he said, with affected indifference.

"Why, yes; don't you?" she retorted.

"Oh, yes," he assented; "but I didn't know whether you would; men and women so very seldom agree upon the question of looks. I find that most of the women I think pretty are considered next door to plain by my lady-friends."

"Well, there can't be any doubt as to your friend's good looks," she said. "She made rather a striking, not to say startling figure perched sideways on that horse, in the pelting rain. I suppose she is one of your neighbours?"

"Yes," replied Stafford, as easily and casually as he could, for the face still floated before him—"yes; but not a very near one. Let me give you some more wine."

"No, thanks. Father, haven't you nearly finished? Mr. Orme has kept us company so nicely that we've been tempted to forget that we are keeping him from his guests."

She rose, and with a peculiarly sinuous movement threw out the train of her dress, and swept languidly to the door Stafford offered her his arm and they entered the drawing-room.

Her appearance naturally caused a little sensation, for some of the men had learnt and told of the story of Stafford's plucky arrest of the bolting horses, and the people were curious to see the father and daughter who had been rescued, and who had proved to be friends of Sir Stephen.

By a sort of tacit understanding, Lady Clausford, who was a good-natured individual, was playing the part of hostess and general chaperon, and Stafford led Miss Falconer up to her.

Before a quarter of an hour had passed Miss Falconer seemed to be quite at home in her novel surroundings; and leaning back in her chair, and slowly fanning herself, received with perfect self-possession the attentions which her beauty, her costly dress, and her still more costly jewels merited. Presently Stafford heard Lady Clansford ask her to sing; and he went to conduct her to the piano.

"My music is upstairs in my box—but it does not matter: I will try and remember something," she said. "I wonder what you like?" She raised her eyes to his, as her fingers touched the keys. "The simple ballad would be rather out of place, wouldn't it? Do you know this thing of Wagner's?"

As she began to sing the talking died down and gradually ceased; and every eye was fixed upon her; for it was evident that she not only had an exquisite voice, but knew how to use it. She sang like an artist, and apparently without the least effort, the liquid notes flowing from her red lips like the water of a mountain rill.

Stafford was surprised, almost startled, but as he stood beside her, he was thinking, strangely enough, not so much of the singer as of the girl he was going to meet on the morrow. When she had finished, there was a general murmur of applause, and Lady Clansford glided to the piano and asked her to sing again.

"You have a really wonderful voice, Miss Falconer. I don't think Melba ever sang that better."

"Melba's register is ever so much greater than mine," remarked Miss Falconer, calmly. "No, thanks; I won't sing again. I think I am a little tired."

She went back to her seat slowly, her fan moving languidly, as if she were too conscious of the worth of her voice to be affected by the murmurs of applause and admiration; and Stafford, as his eyes followed her, thought she resembled a superb tropical flower of rich and subtle colouring and soft and languorous grace.

None of the women would venture to sing after this exhibition, and one of the young men went to the piano and dashed off a semi-comic song which believed the tension produced by Miss Falconer's magnificent voice and style. Then the woman began to glance at the clock and rise and stand about preparatory to going to bed, and presently they went off, lingering, talking, and laughing, in the hall and in the corridors.

The men drifted into the billiard and smoking-room, and Sir Stephen started a pool. He had been at his very best in the drawing-room, moving about amongst the brilliant crowd, with a word for each and all, and pleased smile on his handsome face, and a happy, genial brightness in his voice. Once or twice Sir Stephen approached Mr. Falconer, who leant against the wall looking on with the alert, watchful eyes half screened behind his lids, which, like his daughter's had a trick of drooping, though with a very different expression.

"Your daughter has a magnificent voice, Falconer," Sir Stephen had said in a congratulatory voice; and Falconer had nodded.

"Yes. She's been well taught, I believe," he had responded, laconically; and Sir Stephen had nodded emphatically, and moved away.

"Will you play, Falconer?" he asked, as Stafford gave out the balls. "You used to play a good game."

Falconer shrugged his shoulders.

"Haven't played for years: rather look on," he said.

"Let me give you a cigar. Try these; they are all right, Stafford says."

Falconer seated himself in one of the lounges and looked at the players and round the handsome room in contemplative silence. Sir Stephen's eye wandered covertly towards him now and again, and once he said to Stafford:

"See if Mr. Falconer has some whiskey, my boy?"

As Stafford went up to Mr. Falconer's corner he saw that Mr. Griffinberg and Baron Wirsch had joined him. The three men were talking in the low confidential tone characteristic of city men when they are discussing the sacred subject of money, and Stafford caught the words—"Sir Stephen"—"South African Railway."

Mr. Falconer looked round sharply as Stafford stood at his elbow.

"Eh? Whiskey? Oh, yes, thanks, I have some," he said.

As Stafford returned to the billiard-room, Falconer nodded after him.

"Is the son in this?" he asked, sharply.

"Oh, no," replied the baron, with a smile. "He knows nothing; he ees too young, too—vat do you say?—too vashionable, frivolous. No, Sir Stephen doesn't bring him in at all. You understand? He is ze ornamental, shleeping' pardner, eh?" And he chuckled.

Falconer nodded, and leaning forward, continued the conversation in a low voice. The men went off to bed one by one, and presently only Sir Stephen, Stafford and Falconer remained; and as the latter rose as if to retire, Sir Stephen laid a hand on his shoulder.

"Don't go yet! I should like to have a little chat with you—about old times."

Falconer sank into his seat again and took a fresh cigar, and Stafford left them.



CHAPTER XI.

Sir Stephen closed the door after him, then went back to the smoking-room and stood looking down at Falconer, who leant back in his chair with his cigar in his mouth and eyed Sir Stephen under half-closed lids with an expression which had something of mastery and power in it.

Sir Stephen bit at the end of his moustache, his thick black brows lowered, as if he scarcely knew how to begin the "chat," and Falconer waited without any offer of assistance. At last Sir Stephen said:

"You asked me outside just now, Falconer, if it was to be 'friend or foe?' I'm thinking the question ought to have come from me."

"Yes," assented Falconer, his eyes growing still narrower. "Yes, I suppose it ought."

"Would your answer have been the same as mine—'friends'?" asked Sir Stephen in a low voice.

Falconer was silent for a moment, then he said:

"It oughtn't to have been. If ever a man had cause to regard another as an enemy, I've had cause to regard you as one, Orme!"

Sir Stephen flushed, then went pale again.

"There is no use in raking up the past," he muttered.

"Oh, I've no need to rake it up; it's here right enough, without raking," retorted Falconer, and he touched his breast with his thick forefinger. "I'm not likely to forget the trick you played me; not likely to forget the man who turned on me and robbed me—"

"Robbed!" echoed Sir Stephen, with a dark frown.

Falconer turned his cigar in his mouth and bit at it.

"Yes, robbed. You seem to have forgotten: my memory is a better one than yours, and I'm not likely to forget the day I tramped back to the claim in that God-forsaken Australian hole to find that you'd discovered the gold while I'd been on the trail to raise food and money—discovered it and sold out—and cleared out!"

His eyes flashed redly and his mouth twitched as his teeth almost met in the choice Havana.

Sir Stephen threw out his hand.

"I heard you were dead," he said, hoarsely. "I heard that you had died in a street row—in Melbourne."

Falconer's heavy face was distorted by a sneer.

"Yes? Of course, I don't believe you: who would?"

"As Heaven is my witness—!" exclaimed Sir Stephen; but Falconer went on:

"You didn't wait to see if it were true or not; you cleared out before I'd time to get back, and you took precious good care not to make enquiries. No; directly your partner's back was turned you—sold him; got the price and levanted."

Sir Stephen paced up and done, his hands clenched behind him; his fine leonine head bent; then he stopped in front of the chair, and frowned down into the scowling face.

"Falconer, you wrong me—it was not so bad, so black as it looked. It's true I sold the claim; but I swear that I intended saving half for you. But news was brought in that you were dead—a man said that he had seen you fall, that you were dead and buried. I had to leave the camp the night the money was paid: it would not have been safe to remain: you know what the place was, and that the man who was known to have money carried his life in his hand. I left the camp and tramped south. Before a month had passed, the money had gone; if I had had any doubts of your death, it was too late to enquire; it would have been useless; as I tell you, the money was gone. But I hadn't any doubts; in simple truth, I thought you were dead."

Falconer looked round the luxurious room.

"You lost the money? But you appear to have picked it up again; you seem to be pretty flourishing, my friend; when you got on your feet again and made your pile, why didn't you find out whether your old pal was alive or dead?"

Sir Stephen was silent for a space, then he raised his head and met the other's accusing gaze unflinchingly.

"I'll tell you—I'll tell you the whole truth, Falconer; and if you can make excuse for me, if you can put yourself in my place—"

He drew his hand across his brow as if the sweat had broken out upon it. "The luck was dead against me for a time, the old luck that had haunted you and me; then it swung round completely—as it generally does when it changes at all. I was out in Africa, on the tramp, picking up a day's work now and again at the farms—you know the life! One day I saw a Kaffir boy playing with some rough stones—"

Falconer nodded.

"Diamonds. I fancy I've read an account of the great Sir Stephen Orme's first beginnings," he put in with a touch of sarcasm.

Sir Stephen reddened.

"I daresay. It was the start, the commencement of the luck. From the evening I took those stones in my hands—great Heaven! I can see the place now, the sunset on the hill; the dirty brat playing in the dust!—the luck has stood by me. Everything I touched turned out right. I left the diamond business and went in for land: wherever I bought land towns sprang up and the land increased in value a thousandfold. Then I stood in with the natives: you've heard of the treaty—"

Falconer nodded.

"The treaty that enabled you to hand over so many thousand square miles to the government in exchange for a knighthood."

"No," said Sir Stephen, simply. "I got that for another business; but I daresay the other thing helped. It doesn't matter. Then I—I married. I married the daughter of a man of position, a girl who—who loved and trusted me; who knew nothing of the past you and I know; and as I would rather have died than that she should have known anything of it, I—"

"Conveniently and decently buried it," put in Falconer. "Oh, yes, I can see the whole thing! You had blossomed out from Black Steve—"

Sir Stephen rose and took a step towards the door, then remembered that he had shut it and sank down again, his face white as ashes, his lips quivering.

—"To Sir Stephen Orme, the African millionaire, the high and lofty English gentleman with his head full of state secrets, and his safe full of foreign loans; Sir Stephen Orme, the pioneer, the empire maker—Oh, yes, I can understand how naturally you would bury the past—as you had buried your old pal and partner. The dainty and delicate Lady Orme was to hear nothing—" Sir Stephen rose and stretched out his hand half warningly half imploringly.

"She's dead, Falconer!" he said, hoarsely. "Don't—don't speak of her! Leave her out, for God's sake!"

Falconer shrugged his shoulders.

"And this boy of yours—he's as ignorant as her ladyship was, of course?"

Sir Stephen inclined his head.

"Yes," he said, huskily. "He—he knows nothing. He thinks me—what the world sees me, what all the world, saving you, Falconer, thinks me: one who has risen from humble but honest poverty to—what I am. You have seen him, you can understand what I feel; that I'd rather die than that he should know—that he should think badly of me. Falconer, I have made a clean breast of it—I'm in your hands. I'm—I'm at your mercy. I appeal to you"—he stretched out his white, shapely hands—"you have a child of your own: she's as dear to you as mine is to me—I've watched you to-night, and I've seen you look at her as she moved about and talked and sang, with the look that my eyes wear when they rest on my boy. I am at your mercy—not only mine, but my son's future—"

He wiped the sweat from his forehead and drew a long breath.

Falconer leant back and smoked contemplatively, with a coolness, an indifference to the other's emotion which Sir Stephen found well-nigh maddening.

"Yes," said Falconer, after a pause, "I suppose your house of cards would come down with a crash if I opened my mouth say, at breakfast to-morrow morning, and told—well, all I know of the great Sir Stephen Orme when he bore the name of Black Steve. Even you, with all you colossal assurance, could not face it or outlive it. And as for the boy—it would settle his hash now and forever. A word from me would do it, eh, Orme? And upon my soul I don't know why I shouldn't say it! I've had it in my mind, I've kept it as a sweet morsel for a good many years. Yes, I've been looking forward to it. I've been waiting for the 'physiological moment,' as I think they call it; and it strikes me that it has arrived."

Sir Stephen's face grew strained, and a curious expression crept into it.

"If you ask me why you should not, I can give you no reason," he said. "If you were poor I should offer you money—more, a great deal more than I received for the old claim; but I can see that that would not tempt you to forego your revenge. Falconer, you are not poor; your daughter wears diamonds—"

Falconer shrugged his shoulders.

"No, I'm not in want of money. You're not the only man who has had a change of luck. No, you can't bribe me; even if I were hard up instead of rather flush, as I am, I wouldn't take a hundred thousand pounds for my revenge."

Sir Stephen rose. There was an ominous change in his manner. His nervousness and apprehension seemed to have suddenly left him, and in its place was a terrible, stony calmness, an air of inflexible determination.

"Good!" he said; and his voice had changed also, changed from its faltering tone of appeal to one of steadfast resolution, the steadiness of desperation. "I have made my appeal to you, Falconer, and I gather that I have failed to move you; that you intend to exact your revenge by—denouncing me!"

Falconer nodded coolly.

"And you think that I could endure to live under such a threat, to walk about with the sword of Damocles over my head? You ought to know me better, Falconer. I will not live to endure the shame you can inflict on me, I will not live to tempt you by the sight of me to take your revenge. I shall die to-night."

Falconer eyed him intently, and carefully selected a fresh cigar. When he had as carefully lit it, he said callously:

"That's your business, of course. I shouldn't venture to interfere with any plan of that kind. So you'd sneak out of it, eh, Orme? Sneak out of it, and leave that young fellow to bear the brunt? Well, I'm sorry for him! He seems the right sort—deuced good-looking and high-class—yes, I'm d——d sorry for him!"

Once again Sir Stephen's lips twitched and the big drops of sweat stood on his brow. He stood for a minute looking from right to left like a hunted animal at bay—then with something between a groan and a cry of savagery, he spring towards Falconer with his hands outstretched and making for his tormentor's throat.

Before he could sweep the table aside and get at him, Falconer whipped a revolver from his pocket and aimed it at Sir Stephen.

"You fool!" he said in his harsh, grating voice, "did you think I was such an idiot as to trust myself alone with you unarmed? Did you think I'd forgotten what sort of man you were, or imagined that you'd so changed that I could trust you? Bah! Sit down! Stand back, or, by Heaven, I'll shoot you as I would a dog!"

Sir Stephen shrank back, his hand to his heart, his eyes distended, his face livid as if he were choking and sank into a chair. Falconer returned the revolver into his pocket, and with his foot pushed the inlaid Oriental table towards his host and victim.

"There! Take some brandy! You're too old to play these tricks! That heart of yours was never worth much in the old days, and I daresay it's still more groggy. Besides, we're not in a mining camp or the backwoods now." He sneered. "We're in Sir Stephen Orme's palatial villa on Lake Bryndermere."

Sir Stephen stretched out his hand and felt for the decanter, as if he were suddenly blind and could not see it, and poured himself out some brandy. Falconer watched him narrowly, critically.

"Better? Look here, Orme, take my advice and keep a guard on your emotions: you can't afford to have any with a heart like that."

He paused and waited until Sir Stephen's ashy face had resumed a less deathly pallor.

"And now I'll answer your appeal—I don't intend to denounce you!"

Sir Stephen turned to him with a gesture of incredulity.

"Sounds strange, doesn't it? Humph! Doesn't it strike you that I've had my revenge already? If there is a sweeter one than to see the man who has sold you grovelling at your feet, and praying for mercy, than I don't know it! The great Sir Stephen Orme, too!" He laughed sneeringly. "No, if I'd meant to give you away, Orme, I should have done it to-night in your swell drawing-room, with all your swell guests round you, with your son—ay, and my daughter—to hear the story—the story of Black Steve! But I didn't mean it, and I don't—"

Sir Stephen drew a long breath of relief, and drank some more brandy.

"Thank God!" he murmured. "What can I say—what can I do to—to express my gratitude—my sense of your forbearance, Falconer?"

Falconer, with his eyes narrowed to slits, looked at him keenly.

"Oh, I'll dispense with your gratitude, Orme. We'll agree to forgive and—forget. This is the last word we'll say about it."

Sir Stephen, as if he could scarcely believe his ears, gazed at his magnanimous foe in silence.

"No half measures with me—you remember me of old," said Falconer. "The subject's done with," he moved his thick hand as he were sweeping it away. "Pass the whiskey. Thanks. Now, let's have the chat you kept me up for."

Sir Stephen wiped his lips and forced a smile.

"Tell me about yourself; what you have been doing since we—er—all this long time."

Falconer shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, it isn't as interesting a story as yours," he said. "I've just rubbed along with bad and good luck in streaks; fortunately for me, the good ones were thicker and more frequent than the bad ones. Lake yourself I married; like yourself, I'm a widower. I've one child—Maude. She's been at school and under the care of some people on the Continent, while I've been at work; and I've come to England now to settle down. That tells enough of my story. I know yours, as the rest of the world does. You're famous, you see."

There was a pause; then he looked over his glass, and said:

"What's you little game at the present moment, Orme?"

Sir Stephen looked at him interrogatively, as if he were still rather confused by the terrible scene which they had gone through.

"Why have you built this place and got all these people here?" said Falconer. "I know enough of Wirsch and Griffinberg and the Beltons to be aware chat they wouldn't come down to the lakes at this time of the year unless there was something worth coming for, something—and a pretty good sum—to be made."

Sir Stephen looked down at the floor for a moment, as if he were considering; then he leant forward.

"I'll tell you," he said, with an air of decision, and with a return of his usual coolness and aplomb. A dash of colour rose to his face, his fine eyes grew bright; he was the "man of affairs," the great financier again. "It's Africa this time," he said, in a low voice, and with a glance at the door. "I've another treaty—"

Falconer nodded.

"I am making for a concession—a charter from the government." Falconer nodded again.

"And I want a railway from Danville to Bualbec." His voice almost sank to a whisper. "Griffinberg, Wirsch, and the rest are with me—or nearly so—I have got them down to clench the matter. There are millions in it—if I can bring it off; there is what is worth more than millions to me—"

Falconer nodded.

—"A peerage for Sir Stephen Orme," said Falconer, with a grim smile.

"For Sir Stephen Orme's boy!" said Sir Stephen, with a flush, and a flash of the dark eyes. "It is for his sake that I am making this last throw; for my boy's, Falconer. For myself I am content—why shouldn't I be? But for him—ah, well, you've seen him! You'll understand!"

Falconer leant back and smoked in silence.

"Plaistow is working the Colonial Office, the Beltons are feeling their way in the city; Wirsch—but you know how the thing is done! I've got them down here that they may work it quietly, that I may have them under my eye—"

"And the lords and ladies—they're to have a finger in the pie because, though they can't help you in the African business, they can in the matter of the peerage?"

Sir Stephen smiled. "You'll stand in with us, Falconer? Don't refuse me! Let me make some reparation—some atonement for the past!" He rose and stood smiling, an imposing figure with his white hair and brilliant eyes. Falconer got up slowly and stiffly.

"Thanks. I'll think it over. It's a big thing, as you say, and it will either make you—"

—"Or break me!" said Sir Stephen, but he laughed confidently.

Falconer nodded.

"I'll go up now," he said.

Sir Stephen went to the door with him, and held out his hand.

"Good-night, Falconer!" he said. "Thank you—for my boy's sake!"

Falconer took the warm hand in his cold one and held it for a moment, then dropped it.

"Good-night!" he said, with a nod and a sidelong glance.

Sir Stephen went back and poured himself out another liqueur glass of brandy and heaved a sigh of relief. But it would have been one of apprehension if he could have seen the cruel smile which distorted Falconer's face as he went through the exquisitely beautiful hall and corridors to the luxurious room which had been allotted to him.

There was in the smile and the cold glitter of the eyes the kind of look which the cat wears when it plays with a mouse.



CHAPTER XII.

Ida walked home through the rain very thoughtfully: but not sadly; for though it was still pelting in the uncompromising lake fashion, she was half conscious of a strange lightness of the heart, a strange brightness in herself, and even in the rain-swept view, which vaguely surprised and puzzled her. The feeling was not vivid enough to be happiness, but it was the nearest thing to it.

And without realising it, she thought, all the way home, of Stafford Orme. Her life had been so secluded, so solitary and friendless, that he had come into it as a sudden and unexpected flash of sunlight in a drear November day. It seemed to her extraordinary that she should have met him so often, still more extraordinary the offer he had made that morning. She asked herself, as she went with quick, light step along the hills, why he had done it; why he, who was rich and had so many friends—no doubt the Villa would be full of them—should find any pleasure in learning to herd cattle and count sheep, to ride about the dale with only a young girl for company.

If anyone had whispered, "It is because he prefers that young girl's society to any other's; it is because he wants to be with you, not from any desire to learn farming," she would have been more than surprised, would have received this offer of a solution of the mystery with a smile of incredulity; for there had been no candid friend to tell her that she possessed the fatal gift of beauty; that she was one of those upon whom the eyes of man cannot look without a stirring of the heart, and a quickening of the pulse. Vanity is a strong plant, and it flourishes in every soil; but it had found no root in Ida's nature. She was too absorbed in the round of her daily tasks, in the care of her father and her efforts to keep the great place from going to rack and ruin, to think of herself; and if her glass had ever whispered that she was one of the loveliest of the daughters of Eve, she had turned a deaf ear to it.

No; she assured herself that it was just a whim of Mr. Orme's, a passing fancy and caprice which would soon be satisfied, and that he would tire of it after a few days, perhaps hours. Of course, she was wrong to humour the whim; but it had been hard to refuse him, hard to seem churlish and obstinate after he had been so kind on the night her father had frightened her by his sleep-walking; and it had been still harder because she had been conscious of a certain pleasure in the thought that she should see him again.

For the first time, as she went into the great silent house, she realised how lonely her life was, how drear and uneventful. Now and again, while cantering along the roads on the big chestnut, she had met other girls riding and driving: the Vaynes, the Avorys, and the Bannerdales; had heard them talking and laughing merrily and happily, but it had never occurred to her to envy them, to reflect that she was different to other girls who had friends and companions and girlish amusements. She had been quite content—until now. And even now she was not discontented; but this acquaintanceship which had sprung up so strangely between her and Mr. Orme was like the touch of a warm hand stretched out from the great world, and its sudden warmth awoke her to the coldness, the dreariness of her life.

As she entered the hall, Jessie came in by the back door with her apron full of eggs.

"I saw you come in, Miss Ida, so I thought I'd just bring you these to show you; they're laying finely now, ain't they?"

Ida looked round, from where she stood going through the form of drying her thick but small boots against the huge log that glowed on the wide dog-iron.

"Yes: that is a splendid lot, Jessie!" she said, with a smile. "You will have some to send to market for the first time this season."

"Yes, miss," said Jessie, deftly rolling the eggs into a basket. "But I'm thinking there won't be any need to send them to Bryndermere market. Jason's just been telling me that the new folks up at Brae Wood have been sending all round the place for eggs and butter and cream and fowls, and Jason says that he can get so much better prices from them than from Bryndermere. He was thinking that he'd put aside all the cream he could spare and kill half a dozen of the pullets—if you don't object, Miss Ida?"

Ida's face flushed, and she looked fixedly at the fire. Something within her protested against the idea of selling the dairy produce to the new people at Brae Wood; but she struggled against the feeling.

"Oh yes; why not, Jessie?" she said; though she knew well enough.

"Well, miss," replied Jessie, hesitatingly, and with a questioning glance at her young mistress's averted face, "Jason didn't know at first; he said that selling the things at the new house was different to sending 'em to market, and that you mightn't like it; that you might think it was not becoming."

Ida laughed.

"That's pride on Jason's part; wicked pride, Jessie," she said. "If you sell your butter and eggs, it can't very much matter whether you sell them at the market or direct. Oh, yes: tell Jason he can let them have anything we can spare."

Jessie's face cleared and broke into a smile: she came of a race that looks after the pennies and loves a good "deal."

"Thank you, miss!" she said, as if Ida had conferred a personal favour. "And they'll take all we can let 'em have, for they've a mortal sight of folk up there at Brae Wood. William says that there's nigh upon fifty bedrooms, and that they'll all be full. His sister is one of the kitchen-maids—there's a cook from London, quite the gentleman, miss, with, rings on his fingers and a piano in his own room—and Susie says that the place is all one mass of ivory and gold, and that some of the rooms is like heaven—or the queen's own rooms in Windsor Castle."

Ida laughed.

"Susie appears to have an enviable acquaintance with the celestial regions and the abode of royalty, Jessie."

"Yes, miss; of course, it's only what she've read about 'em. And she says that Sir Stephen—that's the gentleman as owns it all—is a kind of king, with his own body servant and a—a—I forget what they call him; it's a word like a book-case."

"A secretary," suggested Ida.

"Yes, that's it, miss! But that he's quite simple and pleasant-like, and that he's as easily pleased as if he were a mere nobody. And Susie says that she runs out after dinner and peeps into the stables, and that it's full of horses and that there's a dozen carriages, some of 'em grand enough for the Lord Mayor of London; and that there's a head coachman and eight or nine men and boys under him. I'm thinking, Miss Ida, that the Court"—the Court was the Vaynes' place—"or Bannerdale Grange ain't half so grand."

"I daresay," said Ida. "Is the lunch nearly ready, Jessie?"

"Yes, miss; I was only waiting for you to come in. And Suzie's seen the young Mr. Orme, Sir Stephen's son, and she says that he's the handsomest gentleman she ever saw; and she heard Mr. Davis tell one of the new hands that Mr. Stafford was a very great gentleman amongst the fashionable people in London; and that very likely he'd marry one of the great ladies that is coming down. Mr. Davis says that a duchess wouldn't be too fine for him, he stands so high; and yet, Susie says, he's just as pleasant and easy as Sir Stephen, and that he says 'thank you' quite like a common person. But there, how foolish of me! I'm standing here chattering while you're wet through. Do ye run up and change while I put the lunch on, Miss Ida, dear!"

When Ida came down her father was already at the table with his book open at his elbow, and he scarcely looked up as she went to her place.

Now, as a rule, she gave him an account of her rides and walks, and told him about the cattle and the progress of the farm generally, of how she had seen a kingfisher or noticed that the trout were rising, or that she had startled a covey of partridges in the young wheat; to all of which he seemed scarcely ever to listen, nodding his head now and again and returning often to his book before she had finished speaking; but to-day she could not tell him of her morning walk and her meeting with Stafford Orme.

She would have liked to have assured him that he had done Sir Stephen an injustice in thinking him guilty of buying the Brae Wood land in an underhand way, but she knew it would be of no use to do so; for once an idea had got into Mr. Heron's head it was difficult to destroy it. For the first time in her life, too, she was concealing something from him. Once or twice she tried to say:

"Father, the gentleman who was fishing on the river was Sir Stephen Orme's son; I have met him two or three times since, and he has asked me to meet him to-morrow;" but she could not.

She knew he would fly into one of the half-childish passions in which he could not be persuaded to listen to reason, and that he would insist upon the breaking off of her acquaintance with Mr. Orme; and there was so much pain in the mere thought of it that her courage failed her. If she were not to meet him, or if she met him, and told him that she could not remain with him, must not speak to him again, it would be tantamount to telling him that she did not believe his father was innocent; and she did believe it. Though she knew so little of Mr. Orme, she felt that she could trust him.

So she sat almost silent, thinking of what Jessie had told her, and wondering why Stafford Orme should leave the gay party at the Villa to ride with her. Once only in the course of the meal did her father speak. He looked up suddenly, with a quick, almost cunning, glance, and said:

"Can you let me have some money, Ida? I want to order some books. There's a copy of the Percy 'Reliques' in the catalogue I should like to buy."

"How much is it, father?" she asked.

"Oh, five pounds will do," he said, vaguely. "There are one or two other books."

She made a hasty calculation: five pounds was a large sum to her; but she smiled as she said:

"You are very extravagant, dear. There is already a copy of the 'Reliques' in the library."

He looked confused for a moment, then he said:

"But not with these notes—not with these notes! They're valuable, and the book is cheap."

"Very well, dear," she responded; and she went to the antique bureau and, unlocking it, took a five-pound note from a cedar box.

He watched her covertly, with a painful eagerness.

"I suppose you have a large nest egg there, eh, Ida?" he remarked, with a quavering laugh.

"No: a very little one," she responded. "'Not nearly enough to pay the quarterly bills. But never mind, dear; there it is. You must show me the books when they come; I never saw the last you ordered, you know!"

He took the note with an assumption of indifference but with a gleam of satisfaction in his sunken eyes.

"Didn't you?" he said. "I must have forgotten. You're always so busy; but I'll show you these, if you'll remind me. You must be careful of the money, Ida; you must keep down the expenses. We're poor, very poor, you know; and the cost of living and servants is very great—very great."

He wandered off to the library, muttering to himself, with his book under his arm, and the five-pound note gripped tightly in the hand which he had thrust into the pocket of his dressing-gown; and Ida, as she put on her habit and went into the stable-yard to have the colt saddled, sighed as she thought that it would be nice to have just, for once, enough money to meet all the bills and buy all the books her father coveted.

But her melancholy was not of long duration. The colt was in high spirits, and the task of impressing him with the fact that he had now reached a responsible age and must behave like a horse, with something else before him in life than kicking up his heels in the paddock, soon drove the thought of their poverty from her mind and sent the blood leaping warmly and wildly in her veins.

She spent the afternoon in breaking in the colt, and succeeded in keeping Stafford Orme out of her thoughts; but he slid into them again as she sat by the drawing-room fire after dinner—the nights are often cool in the dales all through early summer—and recalled the earnestness in his handsome face when he pleaded to be allowed to "help her."

She sat up for some little time after her father had gone to bed, and as usual, she paused outside his door and listened. All was quiet then; but as she was brushing her hair she thought she heard his door open.

She laid down the brush and stood battling with the sudden fear which possessed her; then she stole out on to the corridor. The old man was standing at the head of the stairs as if about to descend; and though she could not see his face she knew that he was asleep.

She glided to him noiselessly and put her hand upon his arm softly. He turned his sightless eyes upon her, evidently without seeing her, and, fighting against the desire to cry out, she led him gently back to his room.

He woke as they crossed the threshold, woke and looked at her in a stupefied fashion.

"Are you ill, father? Is there anything you want?" she asked, as calmly as she could.

"No," he replied. "I am quite well; I do not want anything. I was going to bed—why have you called me?"

She remained with him for a few minutes, then left the room, turning the key in the door. When she had gone he stood listening with his head on one side; then he opened his hand and looked with a cunning smile at the five-pound note which had been tightly grasped in it.

"She didn't see it; no, she didn't see it!" he muttered; and he went stealthily to the bed and thrust it under the pillow.



CHAPTER XIII.

The morning broke with that exquisite clearness which distinguishes the lakes when a fine day follows a wet one; and, despite her anxiety on her father's account, Ida, as she went down-stairs, was conscious of that sense of happiness which comes from anticipation. She made her morning tour of inspection of the stables and the dairy, and ordered the big chestnut to be saddled directly after breakfast.

When her father came down she was relieved to find that he seemed to be in his usual health; and in answer to her question whether he had slept well, he replied in the affirmative, and was mildly surprised that she should enquire. Directly he had gone off to the library she ran upstairs to put on her habit.

For the first time she was struck by its shabbiness; she had never given a thought to it before. Her evening-dresses, though plain and inexpensive, were always dainty and fresh, but she wore her habit as long as it would hold together, and cared nothing for the fact that her hat was stained by the rain: they were her "working clothes," and strictly considered as such. But this morning she surveyed the skirt ruefully, and thought of the trim and apparently always new habits which the Bannerdale girls wore; and she brushed it with a care which it had never yet received. As a rule she wore a black scarf, or none at all; but as she looked at herself in the glass she was not satisfied, and she found a scarlet tie which she had bought in a fit of extravagance, and put it on. The touch of colour heightened the beauty of her clear ivory face and brightened up the old habit; but she looked at herself in the glass with something like shamefacedness: why was she so anxious about her appearance this morning of all the mornings? For an instant she was tempted to snatch off the tie; but in the end she let it remain; and she brushed the soft tendrils of her hair at her forehead with unusual care before she fastened on her hat.

Her father was walking up and down the terrace slowly as she came out, and he raised his head and looked at her absently.

"I shall probably ride into Bryndermere, father," she said. "Shall I post your letters? I know you will be anxious for that one to the book-sellers to go," she added, with a smile.

His eyes dropped and he seemed disconcerted for a minute, then he said:

"No, no; I'll send it by Jason; I've not written it yet;" and he turned away from her and resumed his pacing to and fro.

Ida went to the stable-yard and got on to Rupert by the aid of the stone "mounting block" from which Charles the Second had climbed, laughingly, to the white horse which figures in so many pictures of the Merry Monarch, and rode out of the court-yard, watched with pride by Jason. Before she had gone far he ran after her.

"If you're riding by West Hill, Miss Ida, perhaps you'd look at the cattle-shed there. Williams says that the roof's falling in."

"Very well," she called back in her clear voice.

"Oh, and, Miss Ida, there's a big stone washed out of the weir; I'm thinking it ought to be put back or we'll have the meadows above flooded this winter."

She laughed and nodded and put Rupert to a trot, for she knew that while she was within hearing Jason would bombard her with similar tales of woe. Not a slate slid from the old roof of the Hall, or a sheep fell lame, but the matter was referred to her.

She rode down the road in the sunlight, the big chestnut moving under her as if he were on springs and she were a feather, and, half unconsciously, she began to hum an air—not one of those modern ones one hears in many drawing-rooms, but an old-fashioned melody which she had found in an ancient music-book in the antique cabinet beside the grand piano. She left the road where it touched the wild moorland of the valley, and Rupert broke into a canter, Donald and Bess, settling into the stride with which they managed to keep up with the big horse.

She had resolved that she would not ride straight to the stream, and she kept up the hill-side, but her eyes wandered to the road expectantly now and again; but there was no sign of a horseman, and after half an hour had passed a sense of disappointment rose within her. It was quite possible that he had forgotten the engagement; perhaps on reflection he had seen that she was quite right in her objections to his strange proposal, and he would not come. A faint flush rose to her face, and she turned Rupert and rode up and over the hill where she could not see the road. But she had no sooner got on top than she remembered that no time had been mentioned, or, if it had, that she had forgotten it. She turned and rode up the hill again, and looking down, saw Stafford riding along the valley in desperate haste, and yet looking about him uncertainly. Her heart beat with a quickened pulse, sending the delicate colour into her face, and she pulled up, and, leaning forward with her chin in her hand, watched him dreamily.

He rode a heavier horse than Adonis; and he had made a change in his dress; in place of the riding-suit, which had smacked of London and Hyde Park, he wore a rough but light coat, thick cord breeches, and brown leather gaiters. She smiled as she knew that he had tried to make himself look as much like a farmer as possible; but no farmer in the dales had that peculiar air of birth and breeding which distinguished Stafford Orme; the air which his father had been so quick to detect and to be proud of.

She noticed how well he sat the great horse, with what ease and "hands" he rode over the rough and treacherous ground. Suddenly he turned his head and saw her, and with a wave of his hand came galloping up to her, with a smile of relief and gladness on his handsome face, as he spoke to the dogs, who clamoured round him.

"I was so afraid I had missed you," he said. "I am late, am I not? Some people kept me after breakfast."

"You are not late; I don't think any time was mentioned," she responded, quickly, though her heart was beating with a strange and novel sensation of pleasure in his presence. "I scarcely expected you."

He looked at her reproachfully.

"Not expect me! But why?"

"I thought you might change your mind," she said.

He checked a quick response, and said instead:

"And now, where do we go first? You see I have got a bit heavier horse. He's a present, also, from my father. What do you think of him?"

She eyed him gravely and critically.

"He's nice-looking," she said, "but I don't like him so well as the one you rode yesterday. Didn't I see him slip just now, coming up the hill?"

"Did he?" said Stafford. "I didn't notice. To tell you the truth, I was so delighted at seeing you that I don't think I should have noticed if he had tumbled on his nose."

"Oh, it wasn't much of a slip," she said, quickly, to cover her slight confusion at his candid confession. "Shall we go down to the sheep first?"

"Anywhere you like," he assented, brightly. "Remember, I'm your pupil."

She glanced at him and smiled.

"A very big pupil."

"But a very humble one," he said. "I'm afraid you'll add, 'a very stupid one,' before long."

As they rode down hill, Stafford stole a look at her unobserved. Ever since he had left her yesterday her face had haunted him, even while Maude Falconer, in all her war paint and sparkling with jewels, had been singing, even in the silent watches of the night, when—strange thing for him!—he had awakened from a dream of her; he had recalled the exquisitely lovely face with its grave yet girlish eyes, and he felt now, with a thrill, that she was even more lovely than she had been in his thoughts and his dreams; that the nameless charm which had haunted him was stronger, more subtle, than even his fancy had painted it. He noticed the touch of colour just below her white slender column of a neck, and wondered why no other woman had ever thought of wearing a crimson tie with her habit.

"What a grand morning," he said. "I don't think I ever saw a morning like this, so clear and bright; those hills there look as though they were quite near."

"It's the rain," she explained. "It seems to wash the atmosphere. My father says there is only one other place which has this particular clearness and brightness after rain: and that's Ireland. There are the sheep. Now," she smiled, "do you know how to count them?"

He stared at her.

"You begin at number one, I suppose," he said.

She smiled.

"But where is number one?"

She spoke to Donald in a low voice, then the collie began to work the sheep up into a heap; Bess assisting with her sharp yap.

"Now they're ready," said Ida. "You must be quick."

Stafford began to count, but the sheep moved and the ones he had counted got mixed up with the others, and he began again and yet again, until he turned with a puzzled and furrowed brow.

"I can't count them," he said. "They won't keep still for a single moment."

She turned to him with a smile.

"There are fifty-two," she said.

"Do you mean to say that you've counted them already?" he exclaimed.

"Yes; I could have counted them twice over by this time. Now, begin again, and begin from the farthest row; and remember when you come to a black one. Keep your eye on that one and start again front him. It's quite easy when you know how." He began again.

"I make it forty-eight."

She shook her head and laughed.

"That would be four missing, and we should have to hunt for them. But they are all there. Try again." He tried—and made it fifty-six.

"Didn't I tell you that I was an idiot!" he said, in despair.

"Oh, you can't expect to learn the first time," she said, consolingly. "It was weeks before I could do it; and I almost cried the first few times I tried: they would move just as I was finishing."

"Oh, well, then I can hope to get it in time," he said. "Did it ever strike you that though we think ourselves jolly clever, that there are heaps of things which a workingman—the men we look down upon—can do which we couldn't accomplish if it were to save our lives. For instance, I couldn't make a horseshoe if my existence depended upon it, and yet it looks as easy as—"

—"Counting sheep," she finished, with a twinkle in her grey-blue eyes.

"Just so," he said, with a laugh. "Shall I have another try?"

"Oh, no; you'd be here all day; and we've got to see if the others are all right; but first I think we'd better go and look at the weir; Jason says that a stone has got washed down, and that means that when the autumn rains come the meadows would be flooded."

"All right: I'm ready," he said, with bright alacrity. "I'm enjoying this. I know now why you look so happy and contented. You're of some use in the world, and I—the rest of us—That's the weir?" he broke off to enquire, as they came in sight of a rude barrier of stones which partially checked the stream.

"That is it," she said. "And Jason is right. Some of the big stones have been washed down. What a nuisance! We shall have to get some men from Bryndermere to put them up again."

Stafford rode up to the weir and looked at it critically.

"Thank Heaven I haven't got to count the stones!" he said. "If you'll kindly hold my horse—he's not so well trained as yours, and would bolt, I'm afraid." He slipped from the saddle as he spoke, and she caught the reins.

"What are you going to do? she asked.

"I don't know yet," Stafford called back, as he waded into the river.

She held the horse and sat reposeful in the saddle and watched him with a smile upon her face. But it grew suddenly grave as she saw Stafford stoop and put his arms round one of the fallen stones; and she cried to him:

"Oh, you can't lift them; it's no use trying!"

Stafford apparently did not hear her, for, exerting all his strength, he lifted the big stone and gradually slid and hoisted it into its place. Then he attacked the other two, and with a still greater effort raised them into a line with their fellows.

Ida watched him as—well, as one watches some "strong man" going through his performance.

It was a well-nigh incredible feat, and she held her breath as one stone followed the other. It seemed to her incredible and impossible, because Stafford's figure was slight and graceful, and he performed the feat with the apparent ease which he had learnt in the 'varsity athletic sports.

The colour rose to her face and her heart beat quickly. There is one thing left for women to worship; and they worship it readily—and that is strength. Stafford could not count sheep—any woman could do that—but he could do what no woman could do: lift those great stones into their places.

So that, as he waded out of the river, she smiled on him instead of at him—which is a very different thing—as she said:

"How strong you must be! I should have thought it would have required two or three men to lift those stones."

"Oh, it's easy enough, as easy as—counting sheep when you know how."

She laughed.

"But you must be very wet," she said, glancing at the water as it dripped from his clothes.

"Oh, it's all in the day's work," he said, cheerfully, more than cheerfully, happily. "Now for the steers."

"They're in the dale," she said; and she looked at him as she spoke with a new interest, with the interest a woman feels in the presence of her master, of the man who can move mountains.

He shook the water from him and rode at her side more cheerfully than he had done hitherto, for he had, so to speak, proved his helpfulness. He might be an idiot, but he could lift weir stones into their place.

"There they are," she said. "And, oh, dear! One of them has got loose. There ought to be fourteen and there are only thirteen!"

"Good heavens! You must have eyes like a hawk's"

She laughed. "Oh, no; I'm used to it, that is all. Now, where can it be? I thought all the fences were mended. I must find it!"

"Stop!" he said. "At any rate, I can find a cow—bullock—steer. Let me go. You wait here."

He rode off as he spoke, and she pulled up the big chestnut and looked after him. Once more the question rose to perplex her: why had he come, why was he riding about the dale with her, counting sheep, wading in the stream, lifting weir stones, and herding cattle? It seemed to be so strange, so inexplicable. And as she followed him with her eyes, his grace and strength were impressed upon her, and she dwelt upon them dreamily. Were there many such men in the world of which she knew so little, or was he one alone, and unique? And how good, how pleasant it was to have him with her, to talk to her, to help her! She had often longed for a brother, and had pictured one like this, strong and handsome, with frank eyes and smiling lips—someone upon whom she could lean, to whom she could go when she was in trouble.

A shout awoke her from her reverie; and looking up she saw the missing steer forcing its way through a hedge on top of a bank. Stafford was riding after it at an easy canter and coming straight for the bank. The steer plunged through the hedge and floundered through the wide ditch, and Ida headed it and drove it towards the rest of the herd. Then she turned in her saddle to warn Stafford of the ditch; but as she turned he was close upon the bank, and she saw the big hunter rise for the leap.

A doubt as to how he would land rose in her mind, and she swung Rupert round; and as she did so, she saw the hunter crash through the hedge, stumble at the ditch, and fall, lurching forward, on its edge.

No man alive could have kept his seat, and Stafford came off like a stone thrown from a catapult, and lay, face downwards, in the long, wet grass.

Something like a hot iron shot through Ida's heart, and sent her face white, and she rode up to him and flung herself from Rupert and knelt beside the prostrate form.

He lay quite still; and she knew quite well what had happened: that he had fallen on his head and stunned himself.

She remembered, at that moment, that she herself had once so fallen; but the remembrance did nothing to soften her present anxiety. She knelt beside him and lifted his head on her knee, and his white face smote her accusingly. He was still, motionless so long that she began to fear—was he dead? She asked herself the question with a heavy pulsation of the heart, with a sense of irrevocable loss. If he was dead, then—then—what had she lost!

Trembling in every limb, she laid her hand upon his heart. It beat, but slowly, reluctantly. She looked round her with a sense of helplessness. She had never been placed in such a position before. Not far from her was a mountain rill, and she ran to it with unsteady steps and soaked her handkerchief in it, and bathed the white, smooth forehead.

Even at that moment she noticed, half unconsciously, the clear-cut, patrician features, the delicate lines of the handsome face.

He had come to this mishap in his attempt to help her. He was dying, perhaps, in her service. A thrill ran through her, a thrill that moved her as by an uncontrollable impulse to bend still lower over him so that her lips almost touched his unconscious ones. Their nearness, the intent gaze of her eyes, now dark as violets, seemed to make themselves felt by him, seemed by some mysterious power to call him back from the shadow-land of unconsciousness. He moved and opened his eyes.

She started, and the colour flooded her face as if her lips had quite touched his, and her eyes grew heavy as, breathing painfully, she waited for him to entirely recover his intelligence and to speak.

"The steer!" he said at last, feebly.

She moistened her lips, and looked away from him as if she were afraid lest he should see what was in her eyes. "The steer is all right; but—but you!"

He forced a laugh. "Oh, I'm all right, too," he said. He looked around hazily. "I must have come a smasher over that bank!"

Then he saw that he was lying with his head upon her knee, and with a hot flush, the man's shame for his weakness in the presence of a woman, he struggled into a sitting posture and looked at her, looked at her with the forced cheerfulness of a man who has come an unforeseen, unexpected cropper of the first magnitude.

"It was my fault. You—you were right about the horse: he ought not to have slipped—Where's my hat? Oh here it is. The horse isn't lame, I hope?"

"No," she said, setting her teeth in her great effort to appear calm and unmoved. "He is standing beside Rupert—" She had got thus far when her voice broke, and she turned her face away quickly; but not so quickly that he did not see her exceeding pallor, the heavy droop of the lids, the sweep of the dark lashes on her white cheek.

"Why—what's the matter, Miss Heron?" he asked, anxiously, and with all a man's obtuseness. "You didn't happen to come to grief in any way? I didn't fall on you?—or anything? I—"

She tried to laugh, tried to laugh scornfully; for indeed she was filled with scorn for this sudden inexplicable weakness, a weakness which had never assailed her before in all her life, a weakness which filled her breast with rage; but from under the closed lids two tears crept and rolled down her cheek; and against her will she made confession of this same foolish weakness.

"It is nothing: I am very foolish—but I—I thought you were badly hurt—for the moment that you might even be—killed!"

He staggered to his feet and caught her hand and held it, looking at her with that look in a man's eyes which is stronger and fiercer than fire, and yet softer than water; the look which goes straight to a woman's heart.

"And you cared—cared so much?" he said, in a voice so low that she could scarcely hear it, hushed by the awe and wonder of passion.

She tried to withdraw her hand, biting her lips, setting them tightly, in her battle for calmness and her old hauteur and indifference; but he held the small hand firmly, felt it quiver and tremble, saw the violet eyes raised to his with a troubled wonder in them; and her name sprang to his lips:

"Ida!" he breathed.



CHAPTER XIV.

"Ida!" The name had sprung from his lips, from his heart, almost unconsciously; it did not seem strange to him, for he knew, as he spoke it, that he had called her so in his thoughts, that it had hovered on his lips ever since he had heard it. But to her—Who shall describe the subtle emotion which thrills through a girl's heart when she hears, for the first time from a strange man's lips, the name whose use hitherto has been reserved for her kith and kin?

She stood erect, but with her head bent, her eyes fixed on the ground, the name, his voice, ringing in her ears; her heart was beating almost painfully, as if with weight of a novel kind of fear, that yet was not altogether fear. Stafford looked at her with the man's, the lover's eagerness, but her face told him nothing. She was so ignorant of the very A B C of love that there was no start of surprise, no word or movement which might guide him; but his instant thought was that she was offended, angry.

"Forgive me!" he said. "You are angry because I called you—Ida! It was wrong and presumptuous; but I have learned to think of you by your name—and it slipped out. Are you very angry? Ah, you knew why I called you so? Don't you know that—I love you!"

She raised her eyes for a moment but did not look at him; they were fixed dreamily on the great hills in the distance, then drooped again, and her brows came together, her lips straightened with a still more marked expression of trouble, doubt, and wonder.

"I love you," he said, with the deep note of a man's passion in his voice. "I didn't mean to tell you, to speak—I didn't know until just now how it was with me: you see I am telling you everything, the whole truth! You will listen to me?"

For she had made a movement of turning away, a slow, heavy gesture as if she were encumbered by chains, as if she were under some spell from which she could not wake.