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forgetting that he was head man in his anxiety to dislodge all these disturbing questions from his mind, and to feel himself in reality what he was.

"I think," said Richard, not without excitement himself, but trying hard not to show his rapid changes of colour, his breathless heat and agitation, "that my father gives good advice, and that you ought to come into the house, where at least we can talk with quiet and decency. There is no reason why you shouldn't come in," he said with nervous vehemence, pushing open the door behind him; "or the queen, for that matter, if she were here. The mistress of it is as spotless as any one of you. That much I may say."

Lady Eskside did not say another word. She grasped her old lord's arm again, and suffered herself to be led into the little parlour, which she had seen before on another occasion, little thinking whose house it was. Her eye, I need not say, was caught at once by the little shawl on the table. She pointed at it hastily to her husband, who stared, totally unaware what it was to which his attention was directed. They put her into an old carved chair, which was one of poor Dick's latest acquisitions before all this wonderful commotion began. Richard, scarcely knowing what he was doing, led the way, introduced them into the strange little room, as a man does when he is in his own house. He had got to feel as if it were his own house. Already he had passed many hours there, feeling himself no intruder. He received his mother and placed her in Dick's easychair as he might have received her in the Palazzo Graziani; and the old lady, with her keen eyes, caught at this, though he was as unconscious of it as a man could be.

"You are at home here," she said to him, with keen suspicion "it's no strange place to you, Richard, though it's strange, strange, to my old lord and me. What does it mean, man?what does it mean? Have you known all the time? Have you been keeping it secret to drive us wild? What is it -what is it you mean?"

"Where is the boy?" said Lord Eskside. "I do not enter into this question between your mother and you. You will satisfy us both, doubtless, about the mystery, which, as you all well know, is thing I abhor. Richard," said the old man, with a break in his voice, "I want to see the boy."

"Listen first, sir," said Richard, indig nant; "how my mother has found out, I don't know; but she is right. Chanceor Providence, if you like the word better

has thrown Val into his mother's hands. I guessed it when I saw you at Rosscraig, and I came here at once and found it was so

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"You guessed it? God forgive you, Richard! You've known, then, all the time; you've exposed us and Val to abuse and insult, and maybe killed the lad and broken my old lord's heart. Oh, God forgive you, Richard! is this the way you've done your duty to us and your boy?"

Lady Eskside wrung her hands. Her old face flushed and grew pale; hot tears filled her eyes. Something of personal disappointment was in the pang with which she felt this supposed deception. Women, I fear, are more apt to think of deception than men. Lady Eskside, in the sharpness of her disappointment, rashly jumped to the conclusion that Richard's knowledge was not an affair of yesterday; that there was something behind more than had been told to her; that perhaps, for anything she could tell, he had been visiting this woman, who was his lawful wife, as if the tie between them had been of quite a different character or perhaps, even, who knows, was trying to palm upon them as his wife some one who did not possess any right to that title. In suspicion, as in other things, it is the first step that costs the most. Lord Eskside did not go so far as his wife did, but the thought began to penetrate his mind too, that if Richard had known this, even for a day, without disclosing it, he had exposed them to cruel and needless pain.

"Catherine," said the old lord, "we need not quarrel to make matters worse. If he recognizes his wife and his other son at last, and it is true that they are here, let us give our attention to make sure of that, and prevent trouble in the future. It is not a question of feeling, but of law and justice. Yes, no doubt, feeling will come in; but you cannot change your son, my lady, any more than he can change his father and mother, which, perhaps, he would have little objection to do. We must put up with each other, such as we are."

"You do me injustice, sir," cried Richaard; "both you and my mother. There has been no deception in the matter. You shall hear how it happened afterwards; but in the mean time it is true

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that she is here, mother. I met her at giving no articulate evidence of emotion. Val's bedside two days ago for the first "Val is up-stairs, I suppose? I am going time, without warning. I believe if I to see him," was all he said in the pause had given her warning, she would have after Richard's story concluded. Lord escaped again - but for Val. I am not Eskside climbed up the narrow wooden made of much account between you," staircase with a shrug of his shoulders. said Richard, with a painful smile. "I He was not satisfied with his son's story, have little occasion to be vain. You, my as his wife had been. He opened one mother, and her, my-wife; what you door after another before he found the think of is not me, but Val." room in which Val was lying. To see the boy stretched there on the bed, with vacant eyes, half dozing, half waking, but quite unconscious of his visitor, went to the old lord's heart far more than Richard's story had done. "If he had spoken out like a man, this might have been spared," he said to himself; and bent over Val's bed to hide the momentary contortion of his features, which brought the water to his eyes. "My poor lad!" he said, with hidden anguish, scarcely noticing for the first moment the nurse on the other side of the bed. She rose with a sudden dilation of terror in her eyes. She had never seen Lord Eskside, and did not know who he was; but felt by instinct that he had been brought hither by the terrible wave of novel events which was about to sweep over her head, and that he had come to take away from her her boy.

"Oh Richard! you would aye have been first with me if you would have let me," said Lady Eskside, as ready to forgive as she had been to censure, her heart melting at this reproach, which was true. As for the old lord, he was not so easily moved either to blame or to pardon. He got up and walked about the room while Richard, still flushed with excitement and a certain indignation, told them the story of the photograph, and his recognition of his wife's face so strangely brought before him by his son. Richard gave his own version of the story, as was natural. He allowed them to perceive the violence of the shock they had given him, without saying very much on the subject; and described how, though incapable of anything else in the excitement of the moment, he had put force upon himself to make his wife's residence known to his lawyer, and to have a watch kept upon her movements. What he said was perfectly true, with just that gloss which we all put upon our own proceedings, showing them in their best aspect; and Lady Eskside received it as gospel, taking her son's hand into her own, following every movement of his lips with moist eyes, entering with tender and remorseful sympathy into those hidden sentiments in his mind which she had doubted the existence of, and which, up to this moment, he had never permitted her to see. Her husband, however, walked about the room while the tale. went on, listening intent, without losing a word, but not so sympathetically staring hard at Dick's homely ornamentations, his bits of carving, his books, all the signs of individuality which were in the place. I don't know that he remarked their merits, though he walked from one to another, with his hands thrust deep into his pockets, and stared almost fiercely at the carving, with eyes wellnigh hidden under his shaggy brows. He did not say anything while Lady Eskside, She put up her hand with a warning weeping and smiling, made her peace gesture. "Hush," she said; "it makes with her son. When she cried, "Oh him restless when he hears a voice yes, my dear, my dear, I understand!" then a curious, exquisite twilight seemed he only worked his expressive eyebrows, to melt over her face as if some last re

Lord Eskside looked at her across the bed where Val was lying. He made her a low bow, with that courtly politeness which now and then the homely old iord brought forth, like an old patent of nobility. But it was difficult for him to know what to say to her-and she gave him no assistance, standing there with a look of panic which disturbed the still, abstracted dignity of her ordinary aspect. "I am afraid I have startled you," he said, his voice softening. "Don't be alarmed. I am your-husband's father. I am sorry, very sorry, that we never met before."

She made no answer, but only a slight tremulous movement intended for a curtsey; then some sense of the necessities of her position, struggling with her fright, she said faintly, "He is just the same — on Saturday he'll be better, please God."

"On Saturday he'll be better! God bless you, my dear! You seem sure? How can you be sure?" cried the old lord, with his eyelids all puckered together to hide the moisture within.

flections of a waning light had caught|erable letter, and all that stramash about her, illuminating her for the moment with the election, and my poor Val's fever — the tenderest subdued radiance-"ex-maybe his life

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cept mine," she added in tones so low as His life! his life!" she said, startto be almost inaudible. The old lording up in alarm from her chair. was deeply touched. What with his Who can say? It's in God's hands, boy's condition, which was worse than he not ours. His mother says he'll be betexpected, and this voice of great, sub-ter on Saturday," Lord Eskside said, dued, and restrained feeling-emotion turning away.

that had no object but to conceal itself - Meanwhile Dick had thrown himself all his prejudices floated away. He was with a certain passion into his work, feelnot in the least conscious of being af-ing a curious reluctance which he had fected by the beauty which was con- never experienced before to receive the cealed, too, like the emotion-indeed orders of the customers, and to run he would have denied that she had any beauty; but the suppression of both and ignoring of them by their possessor had a great effect upon him; for there was nothing in the world more noble in the eyes of the old Scots lord than this power of self-restraint. He went round to her softly, walking with elaborate precaution, and took her hand for a moment; "God bless you," he said then, with another look at Val, left the room. He himself, even with all the self-control he had, might have broken down and betrayed the passionate love and anxiety in him had he waited longer there.

hither and thither launching boats into the water, drawing them up again, dealing out oars and cushions as he had done for years. If he could have pushed out on the stream himself as Val had done, if he could have rowed a race for life or death with some rival oar, that would have calmed him more than anything. Gentlemen like Val, Lord Eskside's heir, future possessor of all those lovely woods, and of the grey old house full of beautiful things, which was so fresh in Dick's memory, could afford to calm themselves down in that way. But Dick, who was only a working man, could not afford it. To him his work was everything, and to that alone, when all his nerves were tingling, could he resort to bring him down again from any fanciful strain of emotion. He ought to be glad to have it to do, Dick felt; for had be been idle, it seemed to him that the beating of his heart would have driven him wild. Now, let it swell as it would, he had enough to do to keep him occupied, and no time to think, heaven be praised ! It was, as it happened fortunately, a very busy day. Dick forgot his dinner-hourforgot everything but the necessity for exertion to keep him from himself. Sometimes he ordered his subordinates about almost fiercely, speaking to them as he "Saw him the boy? Oh my poor had never been heard to speak before. Val!" cried the old lady, weeping; and Sometimes, not thinking, he would rush then she raised her hands and turned to himself to do their work, while they stood her husband with something which was by astonished, with a manner so unusual half an apology and half a reproach. "I that no one knew what to make of him. feel as if I had got my own Richard back Was it possible that the fever was - our own boy and I don't seem able" catching," and that Dick too was going to think of anything else - not even Val."

Lady Eskside was seated in the parlour alone when he entered; she was leaning back in Dick's great chair, with her handkerchief to her eyes. "He has gone to get the doctor, that we may know everything exactly," she said. "He" had changed to her. She had taken back her own son, her very child, into her heart, (had he not the best right ?) and it | was Richard who was "he," not any one else. She was so tender, so happy, so deeply moved by this revolution, that she could scarcely speak to her husband, who, she felt instinctively, had not been subjected to the same wonderful change. "I have just seen him and his mother," said Lord Eskside.

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Lord Eskside took another turn round the little parlour. "I don't want to hurt your feelings, my lady," he said; "but if Richard had had the sense to write to you or me when he wrote to that fine London solicitor of his, all this might have been spared. Sandy Pringle's mis

to have it? But it was a very busy day, and there was plenty of work for everybody, which is a thing that stops speculation. In the afternoon Lord Eskside, straying about the place, found himself on the raft. He had not intended to go there, nor did he know when he got there what he wanted. The old lord was very restless, anxious, and unhappy. He

could do nothing indoors - not even him before; but it was in reality a conkeep still and out of the way, which is trary influence, the determination to show the first duty of man in a house where that he held his own natural position unsickness is; and the unfamiliar place did affected by all the mysterious hints he not tempt him to walk as he might have had listened to, and found in his work a done at home. He had done what he blessed refuge from the mystery which could to occupy himself after the brief he did not understand, but was impatient interview with the doctor, who could say of and despised. Dick passed Lord Esknothing more than had already been said, side over and over again, in his manifold that no change could come until Satur-occupations, touching his hat as he did day, when, for good or evil, the crisis so, but taking no further notice of his might be looked for. After this Lord travelling-companion. The old lord, on Eskside went to the hotel where Richard his side, made no demonstration of inwas living, and engaged rooms, and did terest; but he took up a position on the what he could for the comfort of his wife, edge of the wharf, and followed the young who had come here in her old age with- fellow with his eyes. Dick had pushed out any attendant. But when this slen-back his hat, showing his fair locks and der business was accomplished, he had open face; he was never still for a monothing further to do. He could not ment, darting hither and thither with keep indoors in Dick's little parlour, lithe light frame, and feet that scarcely which they had taken possession of, none seemed to touch the boards. How workof them reflecting that there was another manlike he was, in his element, knowing proprietor whose leave had not been exactly what to do, and how to direct the asked or given; nor could he linger at others who looked to him! and yet, Lord the outer door, where Harding hung Eskside thought, so unlike any one else, about in attendance. The old lord had so free in his step, so bold in his tranquil no heart to say anything to Harding; he confidence, so much above the level of went to the rafts at last in simple rest- the others. He sat down on a bench lessnesss, having, I almost think, for- close by, and knitting his heavy brows, gotten all about Dick. I suppose it di- sat intent upon that one figure, watching verted him for the moment from his own him more and more closely. There were heavy thoughts and painful tension of a great many boating men about, for it suspense, to see the movement in this was just the opening of the season, and busy place. the coming and going some of them were impatient, and none the boats run out into the stream with a were especially disposed to respect the pleasant rustle the slim outriggers now feelings even of the head man at Stylis's. and then carried back all wet and drip-"Here, you, Brown," said one young ping to the boat-houses, as one party man in flannel; "Brown, I say! Can't after another came in. The stir of in-the fellow hear? Are we to wait all day?” different cheerful life, going on carelessly all the same under the eyes of a spectator paralyzed by anxiety and distress, has a curious bewildering effect upon the mind. He had been there for some minutes before he even noticed Dick's presence at all.

"Look alive, can't you?" shouted a second; "he's not half the handy fellow he was." "Spoilt by the undergrads," said another; "he's the pet of all the Eton men." "Brown, Brown! By Jove! I'll speak to Stylis if this goes on. You, Dick! can't you hear?"

He perceived him at last with a thrill I don't know if Dick felt any annoyof surprise. Dick had transmogrifiedance at their impatient outcries, or rehimself; in his working dress he looked sented such an address in Lord Eskside's more "a gentleman" than he had done presence. But he came at the call, as in his Sunday coat. He had a straw hat was his duty, his cheeks a little flushed instead of the black one, a blue flannel but ready to do whatever was wanted of coat, and noiseless white boating-shoes. him. "Here, Brown," said the boating The excitement against which he was man, carelessly; but he never ended struggling gave double animation to his order. For, before another word his aspect, and made him hold himself could be said, Lord Eskside, glooming more erect than uaual, with all the ener- with knitted brows, came hurriedly up to gy of wounded pride. Lord Eskside felt Dick, and put his arm through his. that it must be some consciousness of his true position that gave to Dick's youthful figure that air of superiority which certainly he had not noticed in

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This is no occupation for you," said the old lord. "It is time that this was over;" and before the eyes of the astonished lookers-on, he led him away, too much

astonished for the moment to resist. "Who is the old fellow?" asked the boating men; and when (for rank wil out, like murder) it wss whispered who "Brown's friend” was, a sudden awe fell upon the rafts. A lord! and he had put his arm familiarly into Dick Brown's, and carried him off, declaring this to be no work for him! What could it mean? The effect produced by Val's accident was nothing to the ferment which rose, up and down the river-side, when it was known that a lord - an old lord - not one of your wild undergrads - had walked off Stylis's raft, in broad daylight, armin-arm with Dick Brown.

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

VIOLET went back to Edinburgh the day after her meeting in the woods with Dick. Her heart was so full of what she had heard, that it was all she could do to keep the particulars from old Jean, who was her guardian and companion when, in her trouble, poor child, she managed to escape for a day or two to the Hewan. By a strong effort she kept from talking over the details with her homely old friend; but she could not keep from her the fact that Val was ill. I need not say that Jean knew well enough that there was "something wrong" between the two families a thing she had been aware of, with the curious instinct which all our servants possess - almost before they knew it themselves. And by this time, of course, Jean knew all that popular opinion said about Mr. Pringle's supposed guilt in respect to the election; and she was aware that there had been painful scenes in the house, and that neither his wife, nor his sons, nor his daughter, "held with" the unlucky culprit, who, since the election, had gone about with drooping head "as if he was gaun to be hanged," old Jean said. Jean was very much shocked and distressed when she heard of Val's illness. "I thought there was something out o' the ordinary," she said; "him away when there was yon grand dinner, and a strange look about the house a'thegether. Ye may aye ken when the family's in trouble by the look o' the house. Poor callant there's naething like trouble of mind for bringing on thae fevers; you may take my word, Miss Violet, it's something about that weary election. Eh, what creatures men are ! Can they no fecht fair, and take their neives to ane anither, instead of casting up auld ill stories? They say that's women's

way; for my part, I'm of the opinion, that if women are ill with their tongues, men are waur."

"But fevers are not brought on by trouble of mind,” said Violet, endeavouring to argue against her own inmost convictions. "Fevers are brought on by oh, by very different things, by bad air, and you may read it all in the papers Oh, I hope, I hope it is not that,

Jean "

"If you put your faith in the papers," said Jean, contemptuously, “that say one thing the day, and another the morn, just as it suits them! Oh ay, they'll tell you an honest midden is waur than an ill story, that creeps into the heart and saps the strength. I'm fond o' the fresh air mysel'. We're used to it here up at the Hewan, and it's like meat and drink; but if some ill-wisher was to rake up a nasty story about my auld man that's in heaven, or my John, what do you think would harm me maist, Miss Vi'let,- that, or a' the ill smells in Lasswade? and I'll no say but what that corner by the smdy is like to knock you down-though Marion Miller's bairns, so far as I can see, are no a prin the waur."

Violet did not venture upon any reply, for, indeed, it seemed to her innocent soul that mental causes were far more likely to make one ill than those vulgar evils upon which the newspapers insisted. For her own part, she felt very sure, as old Jean did, that Val's illness arose from the misery and excitement of the election, and not from any lesser cause. I suppose this was quite foolish, and that the poor young member for Eskside must have gone into some cottage, or passed by some drain in the course of his canvassing, which was the real occasion of his fever. My ignorance is too great on such subjects to warrant me in venturing the supposition that the other part of him, that mental part so much discredited and put out of court in the present day-the one thing about us which nobody can quite account for had anything to do with it; but Violet and old Jean, both of them as ignorant as myself but more courageous and both convinced in their different ways that this special development of protoplasm called by ignorant persons their mind, is the most important part of us- unhesitatingly ignored the drain, which no doubt did the mischief, and set down Val's fever to his misery with all the evident precision of cause and effect. Violet could not say any more to the old wo

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