"Perhaps he did not know of your friendship for Brian," said Elizabeth, smiling.

"Then he knew very little of Brian's life and Brian's friends, my dear, and, according to his own account, he knew a good deal. Of course, he is a foreigner, and we must make allowances for him, especially as he was brought up in a monastery, where I don't suppose they learn much about the forms of ordinary life. What puzzles me is the stupidity of one or two other people, who might have let me know in time, if they had had their wits about them. I've a crow to pluck with your Mr. Heron on that ground," concluded Mr. Colquhoun, never dreaming that he was making mischief by his communication.

Elizabeth started forward. "Percival!" she said, contracting her brows and looking at Mr. Colquhoun earnestly. "You don't mean that Percival knew!"

Mr. Colquhoun perceived that he had gone too far, but could not retract his words.

"Well, my dear Miss Murray, he certainly knew something——" and then he stopped short and coughed apologetically.

"Oh," said Elizabeth, with a little extra colour in her cheeks, and the faintest possible touch of coldness, "no doubt he had his reasons for being silent; he will explain them when he comes."

"No doubt," said the lawyer, gravely; but he chuckled a little to himself over the account which Mr. Brett had given him that morning of Mr. Heron's disappointment. (Mr. Brett had thrown up the case, he told his friend Colquhoun; would have nothing more to do with it at any price. "I think the case has thrown you up," said Mr. Colquhoun, laughing slyly.)

He had taken up some papers which he had brought with him and was turning towards the door when a new thought caused him to stop, and address Elizabeth once more.

"Miss Murray," he said, "I do not wish to make a remark that would be unpleasant to you, but when I remember that Mr. Heron was in possession of the facts that I have just imparted to you, nearly a week ago, I do think, like yourself, that his conduct calls for an explanation."

"I did not say that I thought so, Mr. Colquhoun," said Elizabeth, feeling provoked. But Mr. Colquhoun was gone.

Nevertheless, she agreed with him so far that she sent off a telegram to Percival that afternoon. "Come to me at once, if possible. I want you."

When Percival received the message, which he did on his return from his club about eleven o'clock at night, he eyed the thin, pink paper on which it was written as if it had been a reptile of some poisonous kind. "I expected it," he said to himself, and all the gaiety went out of his face. "She has found something out."

It was too late to do anything that night. He felt resentfully conscious that he should not sleep if he went to bed; so he employed the midnight hours in completing some items of work which ought to be done on the following day. Before it was light he had packed a hand-bag, and departed to catch the early train. He sent a telegram from Peterborough to say that he was on the way.

Of course, it was late when he reached Strathleckie, and he assured himself with some complacency that Elizabeth would expect no conversation with him until next morning. But he was a little mistaken. In her quality of mistress, she had chosen to send everyone else to bed: the household was so well accustomed to Percival's erratic comings and goings, that nobody attached any importance to his visits; and even old Mr. Heron appeared only for a few minutes to gossip with his son while he ate a comfortable supper, retiring at last, with a nod to his niece which Percival easily understood. It meant—"I will do now what you told me you wished—leave you together to have your talk out." And Percival felt irritated by Elizabeth's determination.

"Will you smoke?" she asked, when the meal was over.

"I don't mind if I do. Will you come into the study—that's the smoking-room, is it not?—or is it too late for you?"

"It is not very late," said Elizabeth.

When they were seated in the study, Percival in a great green arm-chair, and Elizabeth opposite to him in a much smaller one, he attempted to take matters somewhat into his own hands.

"I won't ask to-night what you wanted me for," he said, easily. "I am rather battered and sleepy; we shall talk better to-morrow."

"You can set my mind at rest on one point, at any rate," rejoined Elizabeth, whose face burned with a feverish-looking flush. "It is, of course, a mistake that you knew a week ago of Brian Luttrell being in London?"

"Oh, of course," said Percival. But the irony in his voice was too plain for her to be deceived by it.

"Did you know, Percival?"

"Well, if you must have the plain truth," he said, sitting up and examining the end of his cigar with much attention, "I did."

She was silent. He raised his eyes, apparently with some effort, to her face; saw there a rather shocked and startled look, and rushed immediately into vehement speech.

"What if I did! Do you expect me to rush to you with every disturbing report I hear? I did not see this man, Brian Luttrell; I should not know him if I did—as Brian Luttrell, at any rate. I merely heard the story from a—an acquaintance of mine——"

"Dino Vasari," said Elizabeth.

"Oh, I see you know the facts. There is no need for me to say any more. Of course, you attach no weight to any reasons I might have for silence."

"Indeed, I do, Percival; or I should do, if I knew what they were."

"Can you not guess them?" he said, looking at her intently. "Can you think of no powerful motive that would make me anxious to delay the telling of the story?"

"None," she said. "None, except one that would be beneath you."

"Beneath me? Is it possible?" scoffed Percival. "No motive is too base for me, allow me to tell you, my dear child. I am the true designing villain of romance. Go on: what is the one bad motive which you attribute to me?"

"I do not attribute it to you," said Elizabeth, slowly, but with some indignation. "I never in my life believed, I never shall believe, that you cared in the least whether I was rich or poor."

Percival paused, as if he had met with an unexpected check, and then went off into a fit of rather forced laughter.

"So you never thought that," he said. "And that was the only motive that occurred to you? Then, perhaps you will kindly tell me the story as it was told to you, for you seem to have had a special edition. Has Dino Vasari been down here?"

She gave him a short account of the events that had occurred at Netherglen, and she noticed that as he listened, he forgot to smoke his cigar, and that he leaned his elbow on the arm of the great chair, and shaded his eyes with his hand. There was a certain suppressed eagerness in his manner, as he turned round when she had finished, and said, with lifted eyebrows:—

"Is that all?"

"What else do you know?" said Elizabeth.

He rubbed his hand impatiently backwards and forwards on the arm of the chair, and did not speak for a moment.

"What does Colquhoun advise you to do?" he asked, presently.

"To wait here until Brian Luttrell is found and brought home."

"Brought home. They think he will come?"

"Oh, yes. Why not? When everybody knows that he is alive there will be no possible reason why he should stay away. In fact, if he is a right-thinking man, he will see that justice requires him to come home at once."

"I should not think, myself, that he was a right-thinking man," said Percival, without looking at her.

"Because he allowed himself to be thought dead?" said Elizabeth, watching him as he relighted his cigar. "But, then, he was in such terrible trouble—and the opportunity offered itself, and seemed so easy. Poor fellow! I was always very sorry for him."

"Were you?"

"Yes. His mother, at least, Mrs. Luttrell, for I suppose she is not his mother really, must have been very cruel. From all that I have heard he was the last man to be jealous of his brother, or to wish any harm to him."

"In short, you are quite prepared to look upon him as a heros de roman, and worship him as such when he appears. Possibly you may think there is some reason in Dino Vasari's naive suggestion that you should marry Mr. Luttrell and prevent any division of the property."

"A suggestion which, from you, Percival, is far more insulting than that of the motive which I did not attribute to you," said Elizabeth, with spirit.

"You wouldn't marry Brian Luttrell, then?"

"Percival!"

"Not under any consideration? Well, tell me so. I like to hear you say it."

Elizabeth was silent.

"Tell me so," he said, stretching out his hand to her, and looking at her attentively, "and I will tell you the reason of my week's silence."

"I have no need to tell you so," she answered, in a suppressed voice. "And if I did you would not trust me."

"No," he said, drily, "perhaps not; but promise me, all the same, that under no circumstances will you ever marry Brian Luttrell."

"I promise," she said, in a low tone of humiliation. Her eyes were full of tears. "And now let me go, Percival. I cannot stay with you—when you say that you trust me so little."

He had taken advantage of her rising to seize her hand. He now tossed his cigar into the fire, and rose, too, still holding her hand in his. He looked down at her quivering lips, her tear-filled eyes, with gathering intensity of emotion. Then he put both arms round her, pressed her to his breast with passionate vehemence, and kissed her again and again, on cheek, lip, neck, and brow. She shivered a little, but did not protest.

"There!" he said, suddenly putting her away from him, and standing erect with the black frowning line very strongly marked upon his forehead. "I will tell you now why I did not try to keep Brian Luttrell in England. I knew that I ought to make a row about it. I knew that I was bound in honour to write to Colquhoun, to you, to Mrs. Luttrell, to any of the people concerned. And I didn't do it. I didn't precisely mean not to do it, but I wanted to shift the responsibility. I thought it was other people's business to keep him in England: not mine. As a matter of fact, I suppose it was mine. What do you say?"

"Yes," said Elizabeth, lifting her lovely, grieved eyes to his stormy face. "I think it was partly yours."

"Well, I didn't do it, you see," said Percival. "I was a brute and a cad, I suppose. But it seemed fatally easy to hold one's tongue. And now he has gone to America."

"But he can be brought back again, Percival."

"If he will come. I fancy that it will take a strong rope to drag him back. You want to know the reason for my silence? It isn't far to seek. Brian Luttrell and the tutor, Stretton, who fell in love with you, were one and the same person. That's all."

And then he walked straight out of the room, and left her to her own reflections.



CHAPTER XXXIV.

PERCIVAL'S ATONEMENT.

Percival felt a decided dread of his next meeting with Elizabeth. He could not guess what would be the effect of his information upon her mind, nor what would be her opinion of his conduct. He was in a state of exasperating uncertainty about her views. The only thing of which he was sure was her love and respect for truthfulness; he did not know whether she would ever forgive any lapse from it. "Though, if it comes to that," he said to himself, as he finished his morning toilet, "she ought to be as angry with Stretton as she is with me; for he took her in completely, and, as for me, I only held my tongue. I suppose she will say that 'the motive was everything.' Which confirms me in my belief that one man may steal a horse, while the other may not look over the wall." And then he went down to breakfast.

He was late, of course; when was he not late for breakfast? The whole family-party had assembled; even Mrs. Heron was downstairs to welcome her step-son. Percival responded curtly enough to their greetings; his eyes and ears and thoughts were too much taken up with Elizabeth to be bestowed on the rest of the family. And Elizabeth, after all, looked much as usual. Perhaps there was a little unwonted colour in her cheek, and life in her eye; she did not look as if she had not slept, or had had bad dreams; there was rather an unusually restful and calm expression upon her face.

"Confound the fellow!"—thus Percival mentally apostrophised the missing Brian Luttrell. "One would think that she was glad of what I told her." He was thoroughly put out by this reflection, and munched his breakfast in sulky silence, listening cynically to his step-mother's idle utterances and Kitty's vivacious replies. He was conscious of some disinclination to meet Elizabeth's tranquil glance, of which he bitterly resented the tranquillity. And she scarcely spoke, except to the children.

"I wonder how poor Mrs. Luttrell is to-day," Isabel Heron was saying. "It is sad that she should be so ill."

"Yes, I wondered yesterday what was the matter, when I met Hugo," said Kitty. "He looked quite pale and serious. He was staying at Dunmuir, he told me. I suppose he does not find the house comfortable while his aunt is ill."

"Rather a cold-blooded young fellow, if he can consider that," said Mr. Heron. "Mrs. Luttrell has always been very kind to him, I believe."

"Perhaps he is tired of Netherglen," said Kitty. ("Nobody knows anything about the story of the two Brian Luttrells, then!" Percival reflected, with surprise. "Elizabeth has a talent for silence when she chooses.") Kitty went on carelessly, "Netherglen is damp in this weather. I don't think I should care to live there." Then she blushed a little, as though some new thought had occurred to her.

"The weather is growing quite autumnal," said Mrs. Heron, languidly. "We ought to return to town, and make our preparations——" She looked with a sly smile from Percival to Elizabeth, and paused. "When is it to be, Lizzie?"

Elizabeth drew up her head haughtily and said nothing. Percival glanced at her, and drew no good augury from the cold offence visible in her face. There was an awkward silence, which Mrs. Heron thought it better to dispel by rising from the table.

Percival smoked his morning cigar on the terrace with his father, and wondered whether Elizabeth was not going to present herself and talk to him. He was ready to be very penitent and make every possible sign of submission to her wishes, for he felt that he had wronged her in his mind, and that she might justly be offended with him if she guessed his thoughts. He paced up and down, looking in impatiently at the windows from time to time, but still she came not. At last, standing disconsolately in the porch, he saw her passing through the hall with little Jack in her arms, and the other boys hanging on to her dress, quite in the old Gower-street fashion.

"Elizabeth, won't you come out?" he said.

"I can't, just now. I am going to give the children some lessons. I do that, first thing."

"Always?"

"Ever since Mr. Stretton left," she said.

"Give them a holiday. I want you. There are lots of things we have to talk about."

"Are there? I thought there was nothing left to say," said she, sweetly but coldly. "But I am going to Dunmuir at half-past two this afternoon, and you can drive down with me if you like."

She passed on, and shut herself into the study with the children. Percival felt injured. "She should not have brought me all the way from London if she had nothing to say," he grumbled. "I'll go back to-night. And I might as well go and see Colquhoun this morning."

He went down to Mr. Colquhoun's office, and was not received very cordially by that gentleman. The interview resulted in rather a violent quarrel, which ended by Percival being requested to leave Mr. Colquhoun's presence, and not return to it uninvited. Mr. Colquhoun could not easily forgive him for neglecting to inform the Luttrells, at the earliest opportunity, of Brian's reappearance. "We should have saved time, money, anxiety: we might have settled the matter without troubling Miss Murray, or agitating Mrs. Luttrell; and I call it downright dishonesty to have concealed a fact which was of such vital importance," said Mr. Colquhoun, who had lost his temper. And Percival flung himself out of the room in a rage.

He was still inwardly fuming when he seated himself beside Elizabeth that afternoon in a little low carriage drawn by two grey ponies—an equipage which she specially affected—in order to drive to Dunmuir. For full five minutes neither of them spoke, but at last Elizabeth said, with a faint accent of surprise:—

"I thought you had something to say to me."

"I have so many things that I don't know where to begin. Have you nothing to say—about what I told you last night?"

"I can only say that I am very glad of it."

"The deuce you are!" thought Percival, but his lips were sealed. Elizabeth went on to explain herself.

"I am glad, because now I understand various things that were very hard for me to understand before. I can see why Mr. Stretton hesitated about coming here; I see why he was startled when he discovered that I was the very girl whom he must have heard of before he left England. Of course, I should never have objected to surrender the property to its rightful owner; but in this case I shall be not only willing but pleased to give it back."

Her tone was proud and independent. Percival did not like it, but would not say so.

"I was saying last night," she continued, "that Brian Luttrell must come back. This discovery makes his return all the more necessary. I am going now to ask Mr. Colquhoun what steps had better be taken for bringing him home."

"Do you think he will come?"

"He must come. He must be made to see that it is right for him to come. I have been thinking of what I will ask Mr. Colquhoun to say to him. If he remembers me"—and her voice sank a little—"he will not refuse to do what would so greatly lighten my burden."

"Better write yourself, Elizabeth," said Percival, in a sad yet cynical tone. "You can doubtless say what would bring him back by the next steamer."

She made no answer, but set her lips a little more firmly, and gave one of the grey ponies a slight touch with the whip. It was the silence that caused Percival to see that she was wounded.

"I have a knack of saying what I don't mean," he remarked, rousing himself. "I beg your pardon for this and every other rude speech that I may make, Elizabeth; and ask you to understand that I am only translating my discontent with myself into words when I am ill-tempered. Have a little mercy on me, for pity's sake."

She smiled. He thought there was some mockery in the smile.

"What are you laughing at?" he said, abruptly, dropping the apologetic tone.

"I am not laughing. I was wondering that you thought it worth while to excuse yourself for such a trifle as a rude word or two. I thought possibly, when I came out with you, that you had other apologies to make."

"May I ask what you mean?"

"I mean that, by your own showing, you have not been quite straightforward," said Elizabeth, plainly. "And I thought that you might have something to say about it."

"Not straightforward!" he repeated. It was not often that his cheeks tingled as they tingled now. "What have I done to make you call me not straightforward, pray?"

"You knew that I inherited this property because of Brian Luttrell's death. You knew—did you not?—that he had only a few days to spend in London, and that he meant to start for America this week. You must have known that some fresh arrangement was necessary before I could honestly enjoy any of his money—that, in fact, he ought to have it all. And, unless he himself confided in you under a promise of secrecy, or anything of that sort, I think you ought to have written to Mr. Colquhoun at once."

"He did not confide in me: I did not see him. It was Dino Vasari who sought me out and told me," said Percival, with some anger.

"And did Dino Vasari intend you to keep the matter a secret?"

"No. The real fact was, Elizabeth, that I did not altogether believe Vasari's story. I did not in the least believe that Brian Luttrell was living. I thought it was a hoax. Upon my word, I am half-inclined to believe so still. I thought it was not worth while to take the trouble."

"You did not know where to find him, I suppose?"

"Well—yes; I had the address."

"And you did nothing?" she said, flashing upon him a look of indignant surprise.

"I did nothing," returned Percival.

"That is what I complain of," she remarked, shortly.

For some time she drove on in silence, lightly flicking her ponies' heads from time to time with her whip, her face set steadily towards the road before her, her strong, well-gloved hands showing determination in the very way she held the whip and reins. Percival grew savage, and then defiant.

"You ask too much," he said, pulling his long moustache, and uttering a bitter laugh. "It would have been easy and natural enough to move Heaven and earth for the sake of Brian Luttrell's rights, if Brian Luttrell had not constituted himself my rival in another domain. But when his 'rights' meant depriving you of your property, and placing Mr. Stretton in authority—I decline."

"I call that mean and base," said Elizabeth, giving the words a low but clear-toned emphasis, which made Percival wince.

"Thank you," he said. And there was another long silence, which lasted until they drew up at Mr. Colquhoun's door.

Percival waited for nearly an hour before she came back, and had time to go through every possible phase of anger and mortification. He felt that he had more reason on his side than Elizabeth could understand: the doubt of Dino's good faith, which seemed so small to her, had certainly influenced him very strongly. No doubt it would have been better—wiser—if he had tried to find out the truth of Dino's story; but the sting of Elizabeth's judgment lay in the fact that he had fervently hoped that Dino's story was not true, and that he had refused to meet Dino's offer half-way, the offer that would have secured Elizabeth's own happiness. Would she ever hear a full account of that interview? And what would she think of his selfishness if she came to know it? Ever since that conversation in Mr. Brett's office Percival had been conscious of bitter possibilities of evil in his own soul. He had had a bad time of it during the past week, and, when he contrasted his own conduct with the generous candour and uprightness that Elizabeth seemed to expect from him, he was open to confess to himself that he fell very short of her standard.

She came back to her place attended by Mr. Colquhoun, who wrapped her rugs about her in a fatherly way, and took not the slightest notice of Mr. Percival Heron. She had some small purchases to make in the town, and it was growing almost dusk before they turned homewards. Then she began to speak in her ordinary tone.

"Mr. Colquhoun has been telling me what to do," she said, "and I think that he is right. Dino Vasari has already gone back to Italy, but before he went, he signed a paper relinquishing all claim to the property in favour of Brian Luttrell and myself. Mr. Colquhoun says it was a useless thing to do, except as it shows his generosity and kindness of heart, and that it would not be valid in a court at all; but that nothing farther can be done, as he does not press his claim, until Brian Luttrell comes back to England or writes instructions. There might be a friendly suit when he came; but that would be left for him (and, I suppose, myself) to decide. When he comes we shall try to get Dino Vasari back, and have a friendly consultation over the matter. I don't see why we need have lawyers to interfere at all. I should resign the property with a very good grace, but Mr. Colquhoun thinks that Mr. Luttrell will have scruples."

"He ought to have," muttered Percival, but Elizabeth took no notice.

"It seems that he went in a sailing vessel," she went on, in a perfectly calm and collected voice, "because he could get a very cheap passage in that way. Mr. Colquhoun proposes that we should write to Pernambuco; but he might not be expecting any letters—he might miss them—and go up the country; there is no knowing. I think that a responsible, intelligent person ought to be sent out by a fast steamer and wait for him at Pernambuco. Then everything would be satisfactorily explained and enforced—better than by letter. Mr. Colquhoun says he feels inclined to go himself."

She gave a soft, pleased laugh as she said the words; but there was excitement and trouble underneath its apparent lightness. "That, of course, would never do; but he has a clerk whom he can thoroughly trust, and he will start next week for the Brazils."

Percival sat mute. Had she no idea that he was suffering? She went on quickly.

"Mr. Salt—that is the clerk's name—will reach Pernambuco many days before the sailing vessel; but it is better that he should be too early than too late. They may even pass the Falcon—that is the name of Mr. Luttrell's ship—on the way. The worst is"—and here her voice began to tremble—"that Mr. Colquhoun has heard a report that the Falcon was not—not—quite—sea-worthy."

She put up one gloved hand and dashed a tear from her eyes. Percival's silence exasperated her. For almost the first time she turned upon him with a reproach.

"Will you remember," she said, bitterly, "if his ship goes to the bottom, that you might have stopped him, and—did not think it worth while to take the trouble?"

"Good God, Elizabeth, how unjust you are!" cried Percival, impetuously.

Elizabeth did not answer. She had to put up her hand again and again to wipe away her tears. The strain of self-control had been a severe one, and when it once slipped away from her the emotion had to have its own way. Percival tried to take the reins from her, but this she would not allow; and they were going uphill on a quiet sheltered road of which the ponies knew every step as well as he did himself.

When she was calmer, he broke the silence by saying in an oddly-muffled, hoarse voice:—

"It is no use going on like this. I suppose you wish our engagement to be broken off?"

"I?" said Elizabeth.

"Yes, you. Can't I see that you care more for this man Stretton or Luttrell than you care for me? I don't want my wife to be always sighing after another man."

"That you would not have," she said, coldly.

"I don't care. I know now what you feel. And if Stretton comes back, I suppose I must go to the wall."

"I will keep my word to you if you like," said Elizabeth, after a moment's pause. She could not speak more graciously. "I did not think of breaking off the engagement: I thought that matter was decided."

"You called me mean and base just now, and you expect me to put up with it. You think me a low, selfish brute. I may be all that, and not want you to tell me so." Some of Percival's sense of humour—a little more grim than usual—was perceptible in the last few words.

"I am sorry if I told you so. I will not tell you so again."

"But you will feel it."

"If you are low and base and mean, of course, I shall feel it," said Elizabeth, incisively. "It rests with you to show me that you are not what you say."

Percival found no word to answer. They were near Strathleckie by this time, and turned in at the gates without the exchange of another sentence.

Elizabeth expected him to insist upon going back to London that night, or, at least, early next morning, but he did not propose to do so. He hung about the place next day, smoking, and speaking little, with a certain yellowness of tint in his complexion, which denoted physical as well as mental disturbance. In the afternoon he went to Dunmuir, and was away for some hours; and more than one telegram arrived for him in the course of the day, exciting Mrs. Heron's fears lest something should have "gone wrong" with his business affairs in London. But he assured her, on his return, with his usual impatient frown, that everything was going exactly as he would like it to do. It was with one of the telegraphic despatches crushed up in his hand, that he came to Elizabeth as she sat in the drawing-room after dinner, and said, with a little paleness visible about his lips:—

"Can I speak to you for a few moments alone?"

She looked up, startled; then rose and led the way to an inner drawing-room, where they would be undisturbed. She seated herself in the chair, which, with unwonted ceremoniousness, he wheeled forward for her; but he himself stood on the hearth-rug, twisting and untwisting the paper in his hand, as if—extraordinary occurrence!—as if he were actually nervous.

"I have a proposition to make to you," he said. He uttered his words very rapidly, but made long pauses between some of the sentences. "You say that Mr. Colquhoun is going to send out his clerk, Salt, to stop Brian Luttrell when he lands at Pernambuco. I have just seen Mr. Colquhoun, and he agrees with me that this proceeding is of very doubtful utility.... Now, don't interrupt me, I beg. If I throw cold water on this plan, it is only that I may suggest another which I think better.... Salt is a mere clerk: we cannot tell him all the circumstances, and the arguments that he will use will probably be such as a man like Luttrell will despise. I mean that he will put it on the ground of Luttrell's own interests—not Dino Vasari's, or—or yours.... What I propose is that someone should go who knows the story intimately, who knows the relations of all the parties.... If you like to trust me, I will do my best to bring Brian Luttrell home again."

"You!" exclaimed Elizabeth. "Oh, Percival, no."

"And why not? I assure you I will act carefully, and I am sure I shall succeed. I have even persuaded Mr. Colquhoun of my good intentions—with some difficulty, I confess. Here is a note from him to you. He read it to me after writing it, and I know what he advises you to do."

Elizabeth read the note. It consisted only of these words: "If you can make up your mind to let Mr. Percival Heron go in Salt's place, I think it would be the better plan.—J. C."

"I'll be on my good behaviour, I promise you," said Percival, watching her, with lightness of tone which was rather belied by the mournful expression of his eyes. "I'll play no tricks, either with him or myself; and bring him safely back to Scotland—on my honour, I will. Do you distrust me so much, Elizabeth?"

"Oh, no, no. Would it not be painful to you? I thought—you did not like Mr. Luttrell." She spoke with great hesitation.

Percival made a grimace. "I don't say that I do like him. I mean to say that I want to show you—and myself—that I do—a little bit—regret my silence, and will try my best to remedy the mischief caused by it. A frank confession which ought to please you."

"It does please me. I am sure of it. But you must not go—you must not leave your work——"

"Oh, my work can be easily done by somebody else. That is what this telegram is about, by-the-bye. I must send an answer, and it depends upon your decision."

"Can I not consult any one? My uncle? Mr. Colquhoun?"

"You know Mr. Colquhoun's opinion. My father will think exactly as you and I do. No, it depends entirely upon whether you think I shall do your errand well, Elizabeth, and whether you will give me the chance of showing that I am not so ungenerous and so base as you say you think me. Tell me to fetch Brian Luttrell home again, and I will go."

And, with tears in her eyes, Elizabeth said, "Go."



CHAPTER XXXV.

DINO'S HOME-COMING.

"It is to be understood," said Percival, two or three days later, with an affectation of great precision, "that I surrender none of my rights by going on this wild-goose chase. I shall come back in a few months' time to claim my bride."

Elizabeth smiled rather sadly. "Very well," she said.

"In fact," Percival went on expansively, "I shall expect the wedding to be arranged for the day after my arrival, whenever that takes place. So get your white gown and lace veil ready, and we will have Brian Luttrell as best man, and Dino Vasari to give you away."

It was rather cruel jesting, thought Elizabeth; but then Percival was in the habit, when he was in a good humour, of turning his deepest feelings into jest. The submission with which she listened to him, roused him after a time to a perception that his words were somewhat painful to her; and he relapsed into a silence which he broke by saying in an entirely different sort of voice:—

"Have you no message for Brian Luttrell, Elizabeth?"

"You know all that I want to say."

"But is there nothing else? No special message of remembrance and friendship?"

"Tell him," said Elizabeth, flushing and then paling again, "that I shall not be happy until he comes back and takes what is his own."

"Well, I can't say anything much stronger," said Percival, drily. "I will remember."

They talked no more about themselves, until the day on which he was to start, and then, when he was about to take his leave of her, he said, in a very low voice:—

"Do you mean to be true to me or not when Luttrell comes home, Elizabeth?"

"I shall keep my word to you, Percival. Oh, don't—don't—say that to me again!" she cried, bursting into tears, as she saw the lurking doubt that so constantly haunted his mind.

"I won't," he said. "I will never say it again if you tell me that you trust me as I trust you."

"I do trust you."

"And I am not so base and mean as you said I was?"

For, perhaps, the first time in her life, she kissed him of her own accord. It was with this kiss burning upon his lips that Percival leaned out of the window of the railway-carriage as the train steamed away into the darkness, and waved a last farewell to the woman he loved.

He had been rather imperious and masterful during the last few days; he felt conscious of it now, and was half-sorry for it. It had seemed to him that, if he did this thing for Brian Luttrell, he had at least the right to some reward. And he claimed his reward beforehand, in the shape of close companionship and gentle words from Elizabeth. He did not compel her to kiss him—he remembered his magnanimity in that respect with some complacency—but he had demanded many other signs of good-fellowship. And she had seemed ready enough to render them. She had wanted to go with him and Mr. Heron to London, and help him to prepare for the voyage. But he would not allow her to leave Strathleckie. He had only a couple of days to spare, and he should be hurried and busy. He preferred saying good-bye to her at Dunmuir.

The reason of his going was kept a profound secret from all the Herons except the father, who gave his consent to the plan cordially, though with some surprise.

"But what will become of your profession?" he had asked of Percival. "Won't three or four months' absence put you sadly out of the running?"

"You forget my prospects," Percival replied, with his ready, cynical laugh. "When I've squared the matter with Brian Luttrell, and married Elizabeth, I shall have no need to think of my profession." Mr. Heron shifted his eye-glasses on his nose uneasily, and screwed up his face into an expression of mild disapproval, but couldn't think of any suitable reply. "Besides," said Percival, "I've got a commission to do some papers on Brazilian life. The Evening Mail will take them. And I am going to write a book on 'Modern Morality' as I go out. I fully expect to make my literary work pay my travelling expenses, sir."

"I thought Elizabeth paid those," said Mr. Heron, in a hesitating sort of way.

"Well, she thinks she will do so," said Percival, "and that's all she need know about the matter."

Mr. Colquhoun, to whom Elizabeth had gone for advice on the day after Percival's proposition, was very cautious in what he said to her. "It's the best plan in the world," he remarked, "in one way."

"In what way?" asked Elizabeth, anxiously.

"Well, Mr. Heron goes as your affianced husband, does he not? Of course, he can represent your interests better than anybody else."

"I thought he was going to prevent my interests from being too well represented," said Elizabeth, half-smiling. "I want him to make Mr. Luttrell understand that I have no desire to keep the property at all."

"There is one drawback," said Mr. Colquhoun, "and one that I don't see how Mr. Heron will get over. He has never seen Brian, has he? How will he recognise him? For the lad's probably gone under another name. It's just a wild-goose chase that he's starting upon, I'm afraid."

"They have seen each other."

"Mr. Heron didn't tell me that. And where was it they saw each other, Miss Murray?"

"In Italy—and here. Here at Strathleckie. Oh, Mr. Colquhoun, it was Brian Luttrell who came with us as the boys' tutor, and we did not know. He called himself Stretton." And then Elizabeth shed a small tear or two, although she did not exactly know why.

Mr. Colquhoun's wrath and astonishment were not to be described. That Brian should have been so near him, and that they should have never met! "I should have known him anywhere!" cried the old man. "Grey hair! do you tell me? What difference does that make to a man that knew him all his life, and his father before him? And a beard, you say? Toots! beard or no beard, I should have known Brian Luttrell anywhere."

Angela Vivian, being taken into their confidence, supplied them with several photographs of Brian in his earlier days. And Percival was admitted to Netherglen to look at a portrait of the brothers (or reputed brothers), painted not long before Richard's death. He looked at it long and carefully, but acknowledged afterwards that he could not see any likeness between his memories of Mr. Stretton and the pictured face, with its fine contour, brown moustache, and smiling eyes, a face in which an expression of slight melancholy seemed to be the index to intense susceptibility of temperament and great refinement of mind. "The eyes are like Stretton's," he said, "and that is all." He took two of the photographs with him, however, as part of his equipment.

Mrs. Luttrell continued in the state in which she had been found after her interview with Dino. She could not speak: she could not move: her eyes had an awful consciousness in them which told that she was living and knew what was going on around her: otherwise she might easily have been mistaken for one already dead. It was difficult to imagine that she understood the words spoken in her presence, and for some time her attendants did not realise this fact, and spoke with less caution than they might have done respecting the affairs of the neighbourhood. But when the doctor had declared that her mind was unimpaired, Mr. Colquhoun thought it better to come and give her some account of the things that had been done during her illness, on the mere chance that she might hear and understand. He told her that Dino had gone to Italy, that Brian had sailed for South America, and that Percival Heron had gone to fetch him back, in order to make some arrangement about the property which Elizabeth Murray wished to give up to him. He thought that there was a look of relief in her eyes when he had finished; but he could not be sure.

Hugo, after staying for some days at the hotel in Dunmuir, ventured rather timidly back to Netherglen. Now that Dino was out of the way, he did not see why he should not make use of his opportunities. He entered the door of his old home, it was true, with a sort of superstitious terror upon him: Dino had obtained a remarkable power over his mind, and if he had been either in England or Scotland, Hugo would never have dared to present himself at Netherglen. But his acquaintances and friends—even Angela—thought his absence so strange, that he was encouraged to pay a call at his aunt's house, and when there, he was led, almost against his will, straight into her presence. He had heard that she could not speak or move; but he was hardly prepared for the spectacle of complete helplessness that met his gaze. There might be dread and loathing in the eyes that looked at him out of that impassive face; but there was no possibility of the utterance by word of mouth. An eternal silence seemed to have fallen upon Margaret Luttrell: her bitterest enemy might come and go before her, and against none of his devices could she protect herself.

While looking at her, a thought flashed across Hugo's mind, and matured itself later in the day into a complete plan of action. He remembered the will that Mrs. Luttrell had made in his favour. Had that will ever been signed? By the curious brusqueness with which Mr. Colquhoun had lately treated him, he fancied that it had. If it was signed, he was the heir; he would be the master ultimately of Netherglen. Why should he go away? Dino Vasari had ordered him never to come again into Mrs. Luttrell's presence; but Dino Vasari was now shut up in some Italian monastery, and was not likely to hear very much about the affairs of a remote country-house in Scotland. At any rate, when Mrs. Luttrell was dead, even Dino could not object to Hugo's taking possession of his own house. When Mrs. Luttrell was dead! And when would she die?

The doctor, whom Hugo consulted with great professions of affection for his aunt, gave little hope of long life for her. He wondered, he said, that she had survived the stroke that deprived her of speech and the use of her limbs: a few weeks or months, in his opinion, would see the end.

Hugo considered the situation very seriously. It would be better for him to stay at Netherglen, where he could ascertain his aunt's condition from time to time, and be sure that there were no signs of returning speech and muscular power. Dared he risk disobedience to Dino's command? On deliberation, he thought he dare. Dino could prove nothing against him: it would be assertion against assertion, that was all. And most people would look on the accusations that Dino would bring as positive slander. Hugo felt that his greatest danger lay in his own cowardice—his absence of self-control and superstitious fear of Dino's eye. But if the young monk were out of England there was no present reason to be afraid. And when such a piece of luck had occurred as Mrs. Luttrell's paralytic stroke seemed likely to prove to Hugo, it would be folly to take no advantage of it. Hugo had had one or two wonderful strokes of luck in his life; but he told himself that this was the greatest of all. He was rather inclined to attribute it to his possession of a medal which had been blessed by the Pope (for, as far as he had any religion at all, Hugo was still a Romanist), which his mother had hung round his neck whilst he was a chubby-faced boy in Sicily. He wore it still, and was not at all above considering it as a charm for ensuring him a larger slice of good fortune than would otherwise have fallen to his share. And, therefore, in a few days after Mrs. Luttrell's seizure, Hugo was once again at Netherglen, ruling even more openly and imperiously than he had done in the days of his aunt's health and strength. His presence there, and Mrs. Luttrell's helplessness, caused some of Angela Vivian's friends to object seriously to her continued residence at Netherglen. She was still a young woman of considerable beauty; and Hugo was two-and-twenty. Of what use could she be to Mrs. Luttrell? She ought, at any rate, to have an older friend to chaperone her, to be with her in her walks and drives, and be present at the meals which she and Hugo now shared alone. Angela took little notice of the remonstrance of aunts and cousins, but when she heard that her brother Rupert was coming to stay at the Herons, and proposed to spend a day or two at Netherglen on his way thither, she felt a qualm of fear. Rupert was very careful of his sister: she felt sure that she would never be permitted to do what he thought in the least degree unbecoming.

Meanwhile, the man who had resolved to be known as Dino Vasari for his lifetime—or at least until he laid down his name, together with his will, his affections, and all his other possessions at the door of the religious house which he desired to enter, was hastening towards his old home, his birthplace, (whether he was Dino Vasari or Brian Luttrell) under sunny Italian skies. He did not quite dare to think how he should be received. He had thwarted the plans of the far-seeing monks: he had made their anxious efforts for his welfare of no avail. He had thrown away the chance of an inheritance which might have been used for the benefit of his Church: would the rulers of that Church easily forgive him?

He reached San Stefano at night, and took up his quarters at the inn, whence he wrote a letter to the Prior, asking to be allowed to see him, and hinting at his wish to enter the monastery for life. Perhaps the humility of the tone of his epistle made Father Cristoforo suspect that something was wrong. To begin with, Dino was not supposed to act without the advice of those who had hitherto been his guardians, and he had committed an act of grave insubordination in leaving England without their permission. The priest to whom he had reported himself on his arrival in London, had already complained to Father Cristoforo of the young man's self-reliant spirit, and a further letter had given some account of "very unsatisfactory proceedings" on Dino's part—of a refusal to tell where he had been or what he had been doing, and, finally, of his sudden and unauthorised departure from British shores. This letter had not tended to put Father Cristoforo into charity with his late pupil—child of the house, as, in a certain sense, he had been for many years, and special pet and favourite with the Prior—he was rather inclined to order Dino back to England without loss of time. Padre Cristoforo set a high value upon that inheritance in Scotland. He wished to secure it for Dino—still more for the Church.

He sent back a curt verbal answer. Dino might come to the cloisters on the following morning after early mass. The Prior would meet him there as he came from the monastery chapel.

Dino was waiting at the appointed hour. In spite of the displeasure implied in Padre Cristoforo's message, his heart was swelling with delight at the sight of the well-known Italian hills, at the sunshine and the sweet scents that came to him with the crystal clearness of the Italian atmosphere. He loved the white walls of the monastery, the vine-clad slopes and olive groves around it, the glimpses of purple sea which one caught from time to time in the openings left in the chestnut-woods, where he had wandered so often when he was a boy. These things were dear to Dino: he had loved them all his life, and it was a veritable home-coming to him when he presented himself at San Stefano.

And yet the home-coming would not be without its peculiar trials. Never once had Father Cristoforo been seriously angry with him, and the habit of obedience, of almost filial reverence, reviving in Dino's heart as he approached the monastery precincts, made him think with some awe of the severity which the Prior's face had sometimes shown to impenitent culprits. Was he impenitent? He did not know. Was he afraid? No, Dino assured himself, looking up to the purple mountains and the cloudless sky, with a grave smile of recognition and profound content, he was afraid of nothing now.

He waited until the service was over. The peal of the organ, the sound of the monks' chant, reached him where he stood, but he did not enter the little chapel. A sense of unworthiness came over him. As the short, sharp stroke of the bell smote upon his ear, he fell upon his knees, and rested his forehead against the wall. Old words of prayer rose familiarly to his lips. He remembered his sins of omission and commission—venial faults they would seem, to many of us, but black and heinous in pure-hearted Dino's eyes—and pleaded passionately for their forgiveness. And then the words turned into a prayer for the welfare of his friend Brian and the woman that Brian loved. Dino was one of those rare souls who love their neighbour better than themselves.

The Prior quitted the chapel at last, and approached his former pupil. He did not come alone, but the brothers who followed him kept at some little distance. Some of the other occupants of the monastery—monks, lay-brothers, pupils—occasionally passed by, but they did not even lift their eyes. Still, there was a certain sense of publicity about the interview which made Dino feel that he was not to be welcomed—only judged.

Father Cristoforo's face was terrible in its very impassiveness. There was no trace of emotion in those rigidly-set features and piercing eyes. He looked at Dino for some minutes before he spoke. The young man retained his kneeling posture until the Prior said, briefly—

"Rise."

Dino stood up immediately, with folded arms and bowed head. It was not his part to speak till he was questioned.

"You left England without permission," said the Prior in a dry tone, rather of assertion than of inquiry.

"Reverend Father, yes."

"Why?"

"There was no reason for me to stay in England. The estate is not mine."

"Who says it is not?"

"Reverend Father, I cannot take it away from those to whom it now belongs," said Dino, faltering, and growing red and white by turns.

The Prior looked at him with an examining eye. In spite of his apparent coldness, he was shocked by the change that he perceived in his old pupil's bearing and appearance. The finely-cut face was wasted; there were hollows in the temples and the cheeks, the dew of perspiration upon the forehead marked physical weakness as well as agitation. There was more kindness in the Prior's manner as he said:—

"You felt, perhaps, the need of rest? The English winds are keen. You came to recruit yourself before going back to fight your cause in a court of law? You wanted help and counsel?"

Dino's head sank lower upon his breast: he breathed quickly, and did not speak.

"Had you not proof sufficient? I sent all necessary papers by a trusty messenger. You received them?"

"Yes." Dino's voice had sunk to a hoarse whisper.

"You have them with you?"

Dino flashed one look of appeal into the Prior's face, and then sank on his knees. "Father," he said, desperately, "I have not done as you commanded me. I could not fight this cause. I could not turn them out of their inheritance—their home. I destroyed all the papers. There is no proof left."

In spite of his self-possession the Prior started. Of this contingency he had certainly never thought. He came a step nearer to the young man, and spoke with astonished urgency.

"You destroyed the proofs? You? Every one of them?"

"Every one."

A sudden white change passed over Padre Cristoforo's face. His lips locked themselves together until they looked like a single line; his eyes flashed ominously beneath his heavy brows. In his anger he did, as he was privileged to do to any inferior member of his community, forgetting that Dino Vasari, with his five-and-twenty years, had passed from under his control, and was free to resent an offered indignity. But Dino had laid himself open to rebuke by adopting the tone of a penitent. Thence it came that the Prior lifted his hand and struck him, as he sometimes struck an offending novice—struck him sharply across the face. Dino turned scarlet, and then white as death; he sank a little lower, and crushed his thin fingers more closely together, but he did not speak. For a moment there was silence. The waiting monks, the passing pupils who saw the blow given and received, wondered what had been the offence of one who used to be considered the brightest ornament of the monastic school, the pride and glory of his teachers. His fault must be grave, indeed, if it could move the Prior to such wrath.

Padre Cristoforo stood with his hand lifted as if he meant to repeat the blow; then it fell slowly to his side. He gathered his loose, black robe round him, as though he would not let his skirts touch the kneeling figure before him—the scorn of his gesture was unmistakable—and hastily turned away. As he went, Dino fell on his face on the marble pavement, crushed by the silence rather than the blow. Monks and pupils, following the Prior, passed their old companion, and did not dare to speak a word of greeting.

But Dino would not move. A wave of religious fervour, of passionate yearning for the old devotional life, had come across him. He might die on the pavement of the cloister; he would not be sorry even to die and have done with the manifold perplexities of life; but he would not rise until the Prior—the only father and protector that he had ever known—bade him rise. And so he lay, while the noon-day sunlight waxed and waned, and the drowsy afternoon declined to dewy eve, and the purple twilight faded into night. If the hours seemed long or short, he could not tell. A sort of stupor came over him. He knew not what was going on around him; dimly he heard feet and voices, and the sound of bells and music, but which of the sounds came to him in dreams, and which were realities, he could not tell. It was certainly a dream that Brian and Elizabeth stood beside him hand-in-hand, and told him to take courage. That, as he knew afterwards, was quite too impossible to be true. But it was a dream that brought him peace.



CHAPTER XXXVI.

BY LAND AND SEA.

At night the Prior sent for him. Dino's hearing was dulled by fatigue and fasting: he did not understand at first what was said. But, by-and-bye, he knew that he was ordered to go into the guest-room, where the Prior awaited his coming. The command gave Dino an additional pang: the guest-room was for strangers, not for one who had been as a child of the house. But he lifted himself up feebly from the cold stones, and followed the lay-brother, who had brought the message, to the appointed place.

The Prior was an austere man, but not devoid of compassion, nor even of sympathy. He received Dino with no relaxation of his rather grim features, but told him to eat and drink before speaking. "I will not talk to you fasting," he said; and Dino felt conscious of some touch of compassion in the old man's eyes as he looked at him.

Dino sat, therefore, and tried to eat and drink, but the effort was almost in vain. When he had swallowed a few mouthfuls of bread and water mixed with a little wine, which was all that he could touch, he stood up in token that he was ready for the Prior's questions; and Father Cristoforo, who had meanwhile been walking up and down the room with a restless air, at once stopped short and began to speak.

Let it be remembered that Dino felt towards this rugged-faced, stern-voiced priest as loving as a son feels towards a wise father. His affections were strong; and he had few objects on which to expend them. The Prior's anger meant to him not merely the displeasure of one in authority, but the loss of a love which had shielded and enveloped him ever since he came to the monastery-school when he was ten years old. He seemed to have an absolute need of it; without it, life was impossible to go on.

Father Cristoforo was not without visitings of the same sort of feeling; but he allowed no trace of such soft-heartedness to appear as he put Dino through a searching examination concerning the way in which he had spent his time in England. Dino answered his questions fully and clearly: he had nothing that he wished to hide. Even the Prior could not accuse him of a wish to excuse himself. He told the story of his interview with Hugo, of the dinner, of Hugo's attack upon him, and of his sojourn in the hospital, where Brian had sought him out and convinced him (without knowing that he was doing so) of his innocence with respect to Hugo's plot. Then came the story of his intercourse with Brian, his discovery that Brian's happiness hinged upon his love for Elizabeth Murray, and his attempts to unravel the very tangled skein of his friend's fortunes. Mr. Brett's opinion of the case, Brian's letter to Mrs. Luttrell, Dino's own visit to Scotland, with its varied effects, including the final destruction of the papers—all this was quietly and fully detailed, with an occasional interruption only from Padre Cristoforo in the shape of a question or a muttered comment. And when the whole story was told the Prior spoke.

Everything that Dino had done was, of course, wrong. He ought never to have seen Hugo, or dined with him: he ought to have gone to Father Connolly, the priest to whose care he had been recommended, as soon as he came out of hospital: he ought never to have interfered in Brian's love affairs, nor gone to Scotland, nor sought to impose conditions on Mrs. Luttrell, nor, in short, done any of the thousand and one things that he had done. As for the destruction of the papers, it was a point on which he (Father Cristoforo) hardly dared, he said, with a shrug of his shoulders, to touch. The base ingratitude, the unfaithfulness to the interests of the Church, the presumption, the pride, the wilfulness, manifested in that action, transcended all his powers of reprobation. The matter must be referred to a higher authority than his. And so forth. And every word he said was like a dagger planted in Dino's breast.

As for his desire to be a monk, the Prior repudiated the notion with contempt. Dino Vasari a monk, after this lapse from obedience and humility? He was not fit to do the humblest work of the lowest servant of those who lived by the altar. He had not even shown common penitence for his sin. Let him do that: let him humble himself: let him sit in dust and ashes, metaphorically speaking: and then, by-and-bye, the Church might open her arms to him, and listen to the voice of his prayer. But now—Father Cristoforo declined even to hear any formal confession: his pupil must wait and prepare himself, before he was fit for the sacrament of penance.

To Dino, this was a hard sentence. He did not know that the Prior was secretly much better satisfied with his submissive state of mind than he chose to allow, or that he had made up his mind to relax his severity on the morrow. Just for this one night the Prior had resolved to be stern and harsh. "I will make him eat dust," he said to himself, out of his real vexation and disappointment, as he looked vengefully at Dino, who was lying face downwards on the ground, weeping with all the self-abandonment of his nature. "He must never rebel again." The Prior knew that his measures were generally effectual: he meant to take strong ones now.

"There is something more in it that I can understand," he murmured to himself, presently, after he had taken a few turns up and down the room. He halted beside Dino's prostrate form, and looked down upon it with a hidden gentleness shining out of his deep-set eyes. But he would not speak gently. "You have not told me all," he said. "Rise: let me see your face."

Dino struggled to his knees, and, after a moment's hesitation, dropped his hands to his sides.

"What else have you to tell me?" said the priest, fixing his eyes on the young man's face, as if he could read the secrets of his soul.

"I have told you all that I did," stammered Dino.

"But not all that you thought."

There was a short silence. Then Dino spoke again, in short-broken sentences, which at times the Prior could scarcely hear.

"Reverend Father, there is one thought, one feeling. I do not know what it is. I am haunted by a face which never leaves me. And yet I saw it twice only: once in a picture and once in life; but it comes between me and my prayers. I cannot forget her."

"Whose face was this?" asked the Prior, with the subtle change of eye and lip which showed that Dino's answer had fulfilled his expectations. "Her name?"

But the name that Dino murmured was not one that Padre Cristoforo had expected to hear from him.

"Elizabeth Murray!" he repeated. "The woman that Brian Luttrell loves—for whose sake you gave up your inheritance—that you might not turn her out. The mystery is solved. I see the motive now. You love this woman."

"And if I have loved her, if I do love her," said Dino, passionately, his whole face lighting up with impetuous feeling, and his hands trembling as they clasped each other, "it is no sin to love."

The Prior gave him a long, steady gaze. "You have sacrificed your faith to your love," he said, "and that is a sin. You have forgotten your obedience to the Church for a woman's sake—and that is a sin. Lastly, you come here professing a monk's vocation, yet acknowledging—with reluctance—that this woman's face comes between you and your prayers. I do not say that this is a sin, but I say that you had better leave us to-morrow, for you have proved yourself unfit for the life that we lead at San Stefano. Go back to Scotland and marry. Or, if you cannot do that, we will give you money, and start you in some professional career; your aims are too low, your will is too weak, for us."

Again the Prior was not quite in earnest. He wanted to try the strength of his pupil's resolve. But when Dino said, "I will not leave you, I will tend the vines and the goats at your door, but I will never go away," the priest felt a revival of all the old tenderness which he had been used to lavish silently on the brown-eyed boy who had come to him from old Assunta.

"I will not go!" cried Dino. "I have no one in the world but you. Ah, my father, will you never forgive me?"

"It is not my forgiveness you need," said the Prior, shortly. "But come, the hour is late. We will give you shelter for the night, at least."

"Let me go to the chapel first," pleaded Dino, in a voice which had suddenly grown faint. "I dared not enter it this morning, but now let me pray there for a little while. I must ask forgiveness there."

"Pray there if you choose," said the Prior; "and pray for the penitence which you have yet to learn. When that is won, then talk of forgiveness."

He coldly withdrew the hand that Dino tried to kiss; he left the room without uttering one word of comfort or encouragement. It was good for his pupil, he thought, to be driven well-nigh to despair.

Dino, left to himself, remained for a few minutes in the posture in which the Prior had left him; then rose and made his way, slowly and feebly, to the little monastery chapel, where a solitary lamp swung before the altar, and a flood of moonlight fell through the coloured panes of the clerestory windows. Dino stood passive in that flood of moonlight, almost forgetting why he had come. His brain was dizzy, his heart was sick. His mind was distracted with the thought of a guilt which he did not feel to be his own, of sin for which his conscience did not smite him. For, with a strange commingling of clear-sightedness and submission to authority, he still believed that he had done perfectly right in giving up his claim to the Scotch estate, and yet, with all his heart, desired to feel that he had done wrong. And when the words with which Father Cristoforo had reproached him came back to his mind, his burden seemed greater than he could bear. With a moan of pain he sank down close beside the altar-steps. And there, through the midnight hours, he lay alone and wrestled with himself.

It was no use. Everything fell from him in that hour except that faith and that love which had been the controlling powers of his life. He had loved Brian as a brother; and he had done well: he had loved Elizabeth—though he had not known that the dreaming fancies which had lately centred round her deserved the name which the Prior had given to them—and he had not done ill; and it was right that he should give to them, what might, perhaps, avail to make their lives a little happier—at any rate all that he had to give. The Prior had said that he was wrong. And would the good God, whom he had always loved and worshipped from the days of his earliest boyhood, would the Good God condemn him, too! He did not think so. He was not sorry for what he had done at all.

No, he did not repent.

But how would it fare with him next day if he told the Prior this, the inmost conviction of his heart? He would be told again that he was not fit to be a monk. And the desire to be a monk—curious as it may seem to us—had grown up with Dino as a beautiful ideal. Was he now to be thrust out into the world—the world where men stole and lied and stabbed each other in the dark, all for the sake of a few acres of land or a handful of gold pieces—and denied the hard, ascetic, yet tranquil and finely-ordered life which he had hoped to lead, when he put on his monkish robe, for the remainder of his days?

Dino was an enthusiast: he might, perhaps, have been disenchanted if he had lived as one of themselves amongst the brethren who seemed to him so enviable; but just now his whole being rose in revolt against a decision which deprived him of all that he had been taught to consider blessed.

Then a strange revulsion of feeling came. There were good men in the world, he remembered, as well as bad: there were beautiful women; there was art, and music, and much that makes life seem worth living. Why, after all, if the monks rejected him, should he not go to the world and take his pleasure there like other men? And there came a vision of Elizabeth, with her pale face turned to him in pity, and her hand beckoning him to follow her. Then, after a little interval, he came to himself, and knew that his mind had wandered; and so, in order to steady his thoughts, he began to speak aloud, and a novice, who had been sent to say a certain number of prayers at that hour in church by way of penance, started from a fitful slumber on his knees, and heard the words that Dino said. They sounded strange to the young novice: he repeated them next day with a sense that he might be uttering blasphemy, and was very much astonished when the Prior drew his hand across his eyes as if to wipe away a tear, and did not seem horrified in the very least. And this was what Dino said:—

"Wrong! Wrong! All wrong! And yet it seemed right to love God's creatures.... Perhaps I loved them too much. So I am punished.... But, after all, He knows: He understands. If they put me out of His church, perhaps He will let me serve Him somewhere—somehow—I don't know where: He knows. Oh, my God, if I have loved another more than Thee, forgive me ... and let me rest ... for I am tired—tired—tired——"

The voice sank into an inarticulate murmur, in which the novice, frightened and perplexed, could not distinguish words. Then there was silence. One little sigh escaped those lips, and that was all. The novice turned and fled, terrified at those words of prayer, which seemed to him so different from any that he had ever heard—so different that they must be wrong!

At four in the morning the monks came in to chant their morning prayer. One by one they dropped into their places, scarcely noticing the prostrate figure before the altar-steps. It was usual enough for one of their number, or even a stranger staying in the monastery, to humiliate himself in that manner as a public penance. The Prior only gave a little start, as if an electric shock passed through his frame, when, on taking his seat in the choir, his eye fell upon that motionless form. But he did not leave his place until the last prayer had been said, the last psalm chanted. Then he rose and walked deliberately to the place where Dino lay, and laid his hand upon his head.

"My son!" he said, gently. There was a great fear in his face, a tremor of startled emotion in his voice. "Dino, my beloved! I pardon thee."

But Dino did not hear. His prayer had been granted him; he was at rest. God had been more merciful than man. The Prior's pardon came too late.

* * * * *

And far away, on a southern sea, where each great wave threatened to engulf the tiny boat which seemed like a child's toy thrown upon the waters, three men were struggling for dear life—for the life that Dino Vasari had been so ready to lay down—toiling, with broken oars, and roughly-fashioned sails, and ragged streamers as signals of distress, to win their way back to solid land, and live once more with their fellows the common but precious life of common men.

They had narrowly escaped death by fire, and were fast losing hope of ultimate rescue. For five days they had been tossing on the waves of the Southern Atlantic, and they had seen as yet no sign of land; no friendly sail bearing down upon them to bring relief. Their stock of food was scanty, the water supply had now entirely failed. The tortures of a raging thirst under a sultry sky had begun: the men's lips were black and swollen, their bloodshot eyes searched the horizon in anguished, fruitless yearning. There was no cloud in all the great expanse of blue: there was nothing to be seen between sea and sky but this one frail boat with its three occupants. Another and a larger boat had set out with them, but they had lost sight of it in the night. There had been five men in this little cockle-shell when they left the ship; but one of them had lost his senses and jumped over-board, drowning before their very eyes; and one, a mere lad, had died on the second day from injuries received on board the burning vessel. And of the three who were left, it seemed as if one, at least, would speedily succumb to the exposure and privations which they had been driven to endure.

This man lay prostrate at the bottom of the boat. He could hold out no longer. His half-closed eyes, his open mouth and swollen features showed the suffering which had brought him to this pass. Another man sat bowed together in a kind of torpor. A third, the oldest and most experienced of the party, kept his hand upon the tiller; but there was a sullen hopelessness in his air, a nerveless dejection in the pose of his limbs, which showed that he had neither strength nor inclination to fight much longer against fate.

It was at nine o'clock on the fifth day of their perilous voyage, that the steersman lifted up his eyes, and saw a faint trail of smoke on the horizon. He uttered a hoarse, inarticulate cry, and rose up, pointing with one shaking finger to the distant sign. "A steamer!" He could say nothing more, but the word was enough. It called back life even to the dull eyes of the man who had lain down to die. And he who was sitting with his head bowed wearily upon his knees, looked up with a quick, sudden flicker of hope which seemed likely enough to be extinguished as soon as it was evident.

For it was probable that the steamer would merely cross the line of vision and disappear, without approaching them near enough to be of any use. Eagerly they watched. They strained their eyes to see it: they spent their strength in rigging up a tattered garment or two to serve as a signal of distress. Then, they waited through hours of sickening, terrible suspense. And the steamer loomed into sight: nearer it came and nearer. They were upon its track: surely succour was nigh at hand.

And succour came. The great vessel slackened its pace: it came to a standstill and waited, heaving to and fro upon the waters, as if it were a live thing with a beating and compassionate heart. The two men in the boat, standing up and faintly endeavouring to raise their voices, saw that a great crowd of heads was turned towards them from the sides of the vessel, that a boat was lowered and pushed off. The plashing of oars, the sound of a cheer, came to the ears of the seafarers. The old sailor muttered something that sounded like "Thank God!" and his companion burst into tears, but the man at the bottom of the boat lay still: they had not been able to make him hear or understand. The officer in the boat from the steamer stood up as it approached, and to him the old man addressed himself as soon as he could speak.

"We're the second mate and bo'sun of the Falcon, sir, and one steerage passenger. Destroyed by fire five days ago; and we've been in this here cockle-shell ever since." But his voice was so husky and dry that he was almost unintelligible. "Mates, for the love of Heaven, give us summat to drink," cried the other man, as he was lifted into the boat. And in a few minutes they were speeding back to the steamer, and the sailors were trying to pour a few drops of brandy and water down the parched throat of the one man who seemed to be beyond speech and movement.

The mate was able to give a concise account of the perils of the last few days when he arrived on board the Arizona; but there was little to relate. The story of a fire, of a hurried escape, of the severance of the boats, and the agonies of thirst endured by the survivors had nothing in it that was particularly new. The captain dismissed the men good-humouredly to the care of cook and steward: it was only the steerage passenger who required to be put under the doctor's care. It seemed that he had been hurt by the falling of a spar, and severely scorched in trying to save a child who was in imminent danger; and, though he had at first been the most cheery and hopeful of the party, his strength had soon failed, and he had lain half or wholly unconscious for the greater part of the last two or three days.

There was one passenger on board the Arizona who listened to all these details with a keener interest than that shown by any other listener. He went down and talked to the men himself as soon as he had the chance and asked their names. One of the officers came with him, and paid an almost equally keen attention to the replies.

"Mine's Thomas Jackson, sir; and the bo'sun's name it is Fall—Andrew Fall. And the passenger, sir? Steerage he was: he was called Mackay."

"No, he warn't," said the boatswain, in a gruff tone. "Saving your presence, sir, his name was Smith."

"Mackay," said the mate, with equal positiveness. "And a fine fellow he was, too, and one of the best for cheering of us up with his stories and songs; and not above a bit of a prayer, too, when the worst came to the worst. I heard him myself."

"No sign of your friend here, Mr. Heron, I'm afraid," whispered the ship's officer.

"I am afraid not. Was there a passenger on board the Falcon called Stretton."

"No, sir. I'm sure o' that."

"Or—Luttrell?"

Percival Heron knew well enough that no such name had been found amongst the list of passengers; but he had a vague notion that Brian might have resumed his former appellation for some reason or other after he came on board. Thomas Jackson considered the subject for a few minutes.

"I ain't rightly sure, sir. Seems to me there was a gent of that name, or something like it, on board: but if so, he was amongst those in the other boat."

"I should like to see this man Mackay—or Smith," said Percival.

The berth in which the steerage passenger lay was pointed out to him: he looked at the face upon the pillow, and shook his head. A rough, reddened, blistered face it was, with dirt grained into the pores and matting the hair and beard: not in the least like the countenance of the man whom he had come to seek.

"We may fall in with the other boat," suggested the officer.

But though the steamer went out of her course in search of it, and a careful watch was kept throughout the day and night, the other boat could not be seen.



CHAPTER XXXVII.

WRECKED.

Percival cultivated acquaintance with the two sailors, and tried to obtain from them some description of the passengers on board the Falcon. But description was not their forte. He gained nothing but a clumsy mass of separate facts concerning passengers and crew, which assisted him little in forming an opinion as to whether Brian Luttrell had, or had not, been on board. He was inclined to think—not.

"But he seemed to have a slippery habit of turning up in odd places where you don't in the least expect to find him," soliloquised Percival over a cigar. "Why couldn't he have stayed comfortably dead in that glacier? Or why did the brain fever not carry him off? He has as many lives as a cat. He, drowned or burnt when the Falcon was on fire? Not a bit of it. I'll believe in Mr. Brian Luttrell's death when I have seen him screwed into his coffin, followed him to the grave, ordered a headstone, and written his epitaph. And even then, I should feel that there was no knowing whether he had not buried himself under false pretences, and was, in reality, enjoying life at the Antipodes. I don't know anybody else who can be, 'like Cerberus, three gentlemen at once.' I shall nail him to one alias for the future, if I catch him. But there seems very little chance of my catching him at all. I've come on a wild-goose chase, and can't expect to succeed."

This mood of comparative depression did not last long. Percival felt certain that the other boat would be overtaken, or that Brian would be found to have sailed in another ship. He could not reconcile himself to any idea of returning to Elizabeth with his task half done.

They were nearing the Equator, and the heat of the weather was great. It was less fine, however, than was usually the case, and when Percival turned into his berth one night, he noticed that the stars were hidden, and that rain was beginning to fall. He slept lightly, and woke now and then to hear the swish of water outside, and the beat of the engines, the dragging of a rope, or the step of a sailor overhead. He was dreaming of Elizabeth, and that she was standing with him beside Brian Luttrell's grave, when suddenly he awoke with a violent start, and a sense that the world was coming to an end. In another moment he was out of his berth and on the floor. There had been a scraping sound, then a crash—and then the engines had stopped. There was a swaying sensation for a second or two, and then another bump. Percival knew instinctively what was the matter. The ship had struck.

After that moment's silence there was an outcry, a trampling of feet, a few minutes' wild confusion. The voice of the captain rose strong and clear above the hubbub as he gave his orders. Percival, already half-dressed, made his appearance on deck and soon learned what was the matter. The ship had struck twice heavily, and was now filling as rapidly as possible. The sailors were making preparations for launching the long boat. "Women and children first," said the captain, in his stentorian tones.

The noise subsided as he made his calm presence felt. The children cried, indeed, and a few of the women shrieked aloud; but the men passengers and crew alike, bestirred themselves to collect necessary articles, to reassure the timid, and to make ready the boats.

Percival was amongst the busiest and the bravest. His strength made him useful, and it was easier for him to use it in practical work than to stand and watch the proceedings, or even to console women and children. For one moment he had a deep and bitter sense of anger against the ordering of his fate. Was he to go down into the deep waters in the hey-day of his youth and strength, before he had done his work or tasted the reward of work well done? Had Brian Luttrell experienced a like fate? And what would become of Elizabeth, sitting lonely in the midst of splendours which she had felt were not justly hers, waiting for weeks and months and years, perhaps, for the lovers who would never come back until the sea gave up its dead?

Percival crushed back the thought. There was no time for anything but action. And his senses seemed gifted with preternatural acuteness. He saw a child near him put her little hand into that of a soldierly-looking man, and heard her whisper—"You won't leave me, papa?" And the answer—"Never, my darling. Don't fear." Just behind him a man whispered in a woman's ear—"Forgive me, Mary." Percival wondered vaguely what that woman had to forgive. He never saw any of the speakers again.

For a strange thing happened. Strange, at least, it seemed to him; but he understood it afterwards. The ship was really resting upon a ledge of the rock on which she had struck: there was little to be seen in the darkness except a white line of breakers and a mass of something beyond—was it land? The ship gave a sudden outward lurch. There went up a cry to Heaven—a last cry from most of the souls on board the ill-fated Arizona—and then came the end. The vessel fell over the edge of the rocky shelf into deep water and went down like a stone.

Percival was a good swimmer, and struck out vigorously, without any expectation, however, of being able to maintain himself in the water for more than a very short time. Escape from the tangled rigging and floating pieces of the wreck was a difficult matter; but the water was very calm inside the reef, and not at all cold. He tried to save a woman as she was swept past him: for a time he supported a child, but the effort to save it was useless. The little creature's head struck against some portion of the wreck and it was killed on the spot. Percival let the little dead face sink away from him into the water and swam further from the point where it went down.

"There must be others saved as well as myself," he thought, when he was able to think at all coherently. "At least, let me keep myself up till daylight. One may see some way of escape then." It had been three o'clock when the ship struck. He had remembered to look at his watch when he was first aroused. Would his strength last out till morning?

If his safety had depended entirely on his swimming powers he would have been, indeed in evil case. But long before the first faint streak of dawn appeared, it seemed to him that he was coming in contact with something solid—that there was something hard and firm beneath him which he could touch from time to time. The truth came to him at last. The tide was going down; and as it went down, it would leave a portion of the reef within his reach. There might be some unwashed point to which he could climb as soon as daylight came. At any rate, as the waters ebbed, he found that he could cling to the rock, and then, that he could even stand upon it, although the waves broke over him at every moment, and sometimes nearly washed him from his hold.