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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Paddy-The-Next-Best-Thing, by Gertrude Page
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Paddy-The-Next-Best-Thing
+
+Author: Gertrude Page
+
+Release Date: December 6, 2011 [EBook #38237]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PADDY-THE-NEXT-BEST-THING ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England
+
+
+
+
+Paddy-The-Next-Best-Thing
+By Gertrude Page
+Published by Frederick A. Stokes Company, New York.
+This edition dated 1916.
+
+Paddy-The-Next-Best-Thing, by Gertrude Page.
+
+________________________________________________________________________
+
+________________________________________________________________________
+PADDY-THE-NEXT-BEST-THING, BY GERTRUDE PAGE.
+
+CHAPTER ONE.
+
+CONCERNING PADDY'S BLOUSE.
+
+Paddy Adair, the "next-best-thing," as she was fond of calling herself,
+and the reason for which will appear hereafter, sat at the table, and
+spread all around her were little square books of "patterns for
+blouses," from which she was vainly endeavouring to make a selection.
+Meanwhile she kept up a running conversation with the only other
+occupant of the room, a girl with dreamy eyes of true Irish blue, who
+sat in the window, motionless, gazing across the Loch at the distant
+mountains.  She heard no word of all her sister was saying, but that did
+not appear to trouble Paddy in the least, so doubtless it was not an
+unusual state of affairs.
+
+"This one with green spots and pink roses would look the best with my
+blue skirt," Paddy said, holding one pattern at arm's length and
+surveying it critically, "but the blue one with the white border would
+look better with my grey.  I wonder which you would choose, Eily?  I
+wonder which would be the most becoming to my peculiar style of beauty,
+or," with a twinkle in her eyes, "I should say the most concealing to my
+unique lack of it.  I think I'll risk the green spots and pink roses,
+because it doesn't really look half bad with the grey.
+
+"Oh, but my hat!" with a comical exclamation of dismay, "there's my
+silly old hat has got pansies in it, and they'd look just awful with the
+green and pink, Eileen!  What _am_ I to do, with all my things different
+colours, that don't seem any of them to go together?  I wonder if I'd
+better bring out my whole wardrobe and go through the hundred and one
+patterns again?  Or shall I have a white-bordered thing, that is not
+particular and will go with just all of them?  Only I'd have to start at
+the beginning to find it, and I'm so sick of the very sight of them.
+Here have I had these patterns three days, and I've already spent about
+five pounds' worth of brain-power upon a blouse that will cost five
+shillings.  If only you'd help, Eileen!" looking up toward the figure in
+the window, "instead of staring at those silly old mountains like a
+stuffed goose!
+
+"Eileen!"--as the dreamer took no notice--"Eileen! do you hear that I'm
+floundering in a sea of patterns!  Your one and only sister, and you sit
+there like an Egyptian mummy stuffed with dried peas!
+
+"I'll make you help--so there,"--and with a sudden movement she swept
+all the books of patterns into her arms and deposited them,
+helter-skelter, upon her sister's head, laughing gayly at the picture of
+solemn-faced Eileen with the little square books scattered all around
+and upon her.
+
+"Now, Miss Sphinx," she said, "do you think you could come down from the
+clouds for five minutes and discuss anything so distressingly earthy as
+clothes?"
+
+Eileen's face broke into a very sweet smile.  She had not in the least
+intended to be indifferent, but long before Paddy commenced consulting
+her she had been in the middle of composing a lovely poem about
+mountains and streams and birds and things, and she had not really heard
+any of her remarks at all.
+
+"What's the matter, Paddy?" she asked, eyeing the scattered patterns
+with amusement.
+
+"Matter!" cried Paddy, "everything's the matter!  How on earth am I to
+select a blouse that will go with a blue dress, a green dress, a grey
+dress, a hat with pansies in, and a scarlet tam-o'-shanter!  I've been
+worrying with those stupid patterns for days, and instead of getting any
+nearer a decision, I keep on thinking of something fresh that nothing
+seems to go with.  Now it's your turn to worry; you ought to, you know,
+because Charity begins at home."
+
+"Why not have something in cream?" suggested Eileen; "it saves a lot of
+bother."
+
+"Yes, and what do I look like in cream, with my sallow skin?  It's all
+very well for you with your ivory and roses, you look well in anything.
+I don't think it was at all fair for you to have everything nice while I
+am burdened for life with a sallow skin and a snub nose.  Cream flannel
+would be nearly as bad as brown holland for me, and when I wear brown
+holland you can't tell where the dress ends and I begin," and the
+corners of Paddy's mischievous mouth were momentarily drawn down in
+great disgust.
+
+"You could wear bright-coloured ties," suggested Eileen, "and have one
+of every colour you wanted."
+
+"Why so I could," brightening up, "and provided I don't always lose the
+colour I want at the moment of requiring it, it will save a lot of
+bother."
+
+"But you always will, you know," said a gay masculine voice; "you'll
+keep every one waiting five minutes longer than usual hunting for the
+required colour, and then turn up in a red tie with a green hat," and
+before either of them could speak, Jack O'Hara, from the Parsonage, was
+coming through the window, head first, trailing his long legs after him.
+"I've just had a little practice at this sort of thing," he ran on.  "I
+came from Newry, with the Burtons, a whole carriage full of them, and we
+had a great time.  The train was just going to start when I arrived, and
+the station master had locked their compartment, and when I asked him to
+let me in, he tried to put me into a smoker next door.  I said, `No,
+thanks, not for Jack this journey.'  He murmured something about the
+Burton's carriage being full up, and I couldn't go in it, so I said,
+`You see if I can't,' and took a header through the window, right on to
+their laps."
+
+"But you don't know them!" exclaimed Paddy, whose face at the same time
+expressed the greatest relish at the episode.
+
+"I've been introduced," was the calm reply.  "Fletcher introduced me in
+Hill Street a week ago."
+
+"Whatever did they think of you?" asked Eileen, unable to resist
+smiling.
+
+"Oh, we had a ripping time.  They're awfully jolly girls, and they had
+that little imp Basil with them.  He amused himself trying to throw
+everything he could get at out of the window as we went along.  But
+touching this blouse," with a sudden change of voice, "why don't you ask
+my advice?  You haven't either of you a grain of taste compared to
+mine."
+
+"Yours!" exclaimed Paddy scornfully, "and there you sit with emerald
+green in your stockings, a yellow waistcoat, and a terra cotta tie."
+
+"What's the matter with my stockings?" surveying his fine pair of legs
+with an air of pride.  "That's the O'Hara tartan; I'm very proud of it.
+You're not supposed to look at me all at once.  You should enjoy the
+stockings first, and then gradually work up to the waistcoat, and
+afterward to the tie."
+
+"Get thoroughly seasoned and strengthened before reaching the face, I
+suppose you mean!" said Paddy, for which a well-aimed cushion brought
+her rippling red-brown hair half-way down her back.
+
+Not that Jack had any occasion to feel insulted, because after
+twenty-four years' acquaintance with a looking glass, it was hardly
+likely he could be totally oblivious to the fact that Nature had been
+almost prodigal to him in her good gifts.  One might go far to find a
+more sunny pair of blue eyes, a brighter smile, or a more handsome
+specimen of manhood generally.  And to this was added a rare fineness of
+disposition, so full of sincerity and sweetness, that there was no room
+for anything small at all, not even the personal vanity that one would
+have felt obliged to forgive him.  But, then, as a matter of fact, every
+one forgave Jack anything, and there was scarcely a house within a
+radius of twelve miles where he did not come in and out just as he
+pleased, finding an unfailing welcome when he entered, and leaving the
+same regret when he left.  Yet he did things that would not have been
+suffered, by one in a thousand, in anyone else.  He shot over every
+one's moors and covers uninvited, he fished every one's stream, he
+sailed every one's yacht, and rode most people's horses.  He was, in
+fact, an arrant poacher, and yet neither gamekeeper nor owner could
+withstand his witty sallies, nor the laughter in his blue eyes when he
+was caught, and the young sinner himself used to say that though he was
+a poor clergyman's son with scarcely a penny to his name, he had some of
+the finest shooting and fishing in Ireland, and lived a life a prince
+might envy.  Of course he ought to have been worrying about his future,
+and what would eventually become of him, but he was far too thoroughly
+Irish to do anything so foolish.  "What's the use of worrying yet!" he
+would say.  "Can't a fellow have a good time in peace, while he has the
+chance!  I'll start worrying presently--if I don't forget"; then he
+would probably give his last sixpence to a beggar, and immediately
+afterward go into a shop to buy something for Aunt Jane that he thought
+would please her; and when he discovered, with surprise, that he was
+unable to pay for it, he would get the shopkeeper to put it down to his
+father and promise to call in another day with the money.  But that
+would generally be the very last he would remember of it, and two or
+three months later the Rev Patrick O'Hara would wonder when and why he
+had bought that copy of "The Eternal City," or that work-basket with red
+lining.  It was no use asking Jack, because he had always forgotten; and
+though he would immediately empty his pockets into his father's lap, so
+to speak, there was never enough in them to make it worth while.  It was
+quite the exception for Jack ever to remember anything.  If he rowed
+across to Warrenpoint to buy the sausages for Sunday's breakfast, he
+would be quite as likely as not to return without them; and if he took a
+note, it was a hundred to one it came back in his pocket unopened, and
+remained there several days.
+
+"Now I wonder what I came across for, Pat!" was a usual remark to the
+old boatman, when on the point of rowing himself back again.
+
+"Faith!  Ye've a head like a sieve, Mr Jack," Pat would reply.  "Was it
+they sausages agen? or maybe something at the grocers? or some shoe
+laces for 'is riverence?"
+
+"I don't know, I'm sure, Pat, but I'll just have to go and ask what I've
+forgotten.  Begorra! if I'd no head at all to put these things into,
+they couldn't slip out again, could they! and then I shouldn't vex Aunt
+Jane's soul with my forgetfulness.  If it was sausages, Pat, I'll fire
+my gun three times off the landing-stage, and you must just go up to the
+butcher yourself and bring them across;" with which he would whistle a
+merry tune and row leisurely back across the Loch.  But long before he
+reached the other side, he would again have forgotten, and instead of
+going at once to the Parsonage, he would stroll into the garden of The
+Ghan House, which adjoined, to see if Paddy were available for the
+afternoon, or if by chance Eileen wandered dreamily under the trees
+gazing at the mountains.
+
+One of the great problems of Jack's existence at that time, indeed, the
+only one that he ever took seriously, was whether he liked Paddy or
+Eileen the best.  Ever since he was two years old, the Adairs had lived
+in The Ghan House, next door to the Parsonage, and he always declared he
+had distinct recollections of a long white bolster-like apparition in a
+nurse's arms, from the first day it appeared in the garden.  He could
+just get about sufficiently well alone, then, to be always in mischief,
+and at his first opportunity, when the two nurses were deeply engaged in
+conversation, he got hold of the long clothes and tugged with all his
+might and main, to pull the baby on to the ground, a feat which he very
+nearly achieved.  That was Eileen, and just as she had looked at him
+with big, calm, thoughtful eyes, then, not in the least disturbed by his
+vigorous attempts to unseat her, so she looked at him now in the first
+bloom of her beauty, quelling his over-exuberance of spirit, calming his
+boyish audacity, and making him sometimes feel as if he wanted to lie
+down and let her walk over him.  But then on the other hand Paddy was
+such good fun!  When the second bolster-like apparition appeared, he was
+four, and being somewhat weary of the solemn two-year-old Eileen he took
+rapidly to the ugly little brown-faced baby, whose eyes already began to
+dance with a suggestion of the mischievous tendency which only developed
+steadily year by year and claimed them kindred spirits from their
+earliest infancy.  What the nurses at The Ghan House and the Parsonage
+suffered over those two imps of wickedness would fill a whole book; and
+why they were not drowned over and over again, or killed falling from
+trees, or run over on the railway that skirted the grounds, or
+suffocated in mountain bogs, remains forever one of the mysteries of
+their existence.  And things were much the same still, though the nurses
+were no more and they had reached the mature ages of twenty-four and
+twenty, respectively.  Where Jack went Paddy went, or very usually
+followed; and there was scarcely an act of daring even their busy brains
+could conceive, that they two had not achieved together--much to General
+Adair's delight and Mrs Adair's disquiet, for she felt that if her
+scapegrace daughter were ever to grow up at all she really ought to
+begin at once; and yet was quite at a loss by what procedure the change
+should commence.  Boarding school had been tried, but there the girl had
+drooped and pined to such an extent that when the General went one day
+to see her, he had been so shocked and upset that he had had her trunk
+packed at once, and taken her straight back to Ireland without telling
+her mother anything about it, until they walked into the hall of The
+Ghan House.
+
+"I can't help it," was all he had said, in reply to maternal
+remonstrances.  "She wasn't meant for boarding school life.  I expect
+when the Lord made her, He fashioned her for running wild by the
+mountains and Loch, and well just have to let her grow up in her own
+way."  And an hour later he laughed till he nearly made himself ill over
+the spectacle of a small boat upside down in the bay, with Paddy
+clinging to it, while a coal barge waited alongside to pick her up and
+presently landed her close by the General's landing-stage, a mass of mud
+and water and coal dust.
+
+"Better not let your mother see you," he managed to gasp.  "Faith!  I've
+wanted a boy all my life, but there's no doubt I've got the very next
+best thing."  Then he went off to the Parsonage to tell Miss Jane and
+Miss Mary O'Hara, while Paddy slipped in the back way and was smuggled
+up to the bathroom by a faithful old housekeeper who worshipped any
+flesh and blood related to the General, whom she had known ever since he
+joined the Dublin Fusiliers, and embarked on the career that made his
+old regiment as proud and as fond of him, as he, to his last gasp, was
+of them.
+
+But to return to the vexed question of the blouse, the three young
+people, having settled the difficulty concerning each other's taste to
+their satisfaction, though in a somewhat unflattering fashion, Jack and
+Paddy sat on the table swinging their feet and discussed the delicate
+question of what would best suit the latter's complexion.
+
+Then suddenly Jack looked up with an innocent expression.  "What's the
+good of wasting all this time about a body's complexion when they
+haven't got one!" he said.
+
+"How dare you!  I've a beautiful olive tinge!"
+
+"Olive!" teasingly; "why you look as if you'd washed your face with my
+brown boot polish!  It must be rather awful to be so ugly that you look
+much the same in anything," he finished.
+
+"Oh, you scoundrel!--you long-legged kangaroo!--you big-footed
+elephant!--you--you--" and failing words altogether to express her
+feelings, Paddy commenced belabouring him over the head with a small
+sofa bolster, calling out to Eileen to "be a man and come and help her."
+
+"No, no," gasped Jack, struggling to protect himself, "remain a woman,
+Eileen, and be ready to bandage my wounds when this vixen has worn
+herself out.  Who would have dreamt I was letting myself in for this!
+Why I thought she knew she was ugly, it didn't seem possible she could
+help knowing it!--I--I--" but just then the door opened and in the midst
+of the racket Miss Jane and Miss Mary O'Hara stepped daintily into the
+room.
+
+CHAPTER TWO.
+
+THE MISSES O'HARA.
+
+In all the neighbourhood of the Mourne Mountains there was probably
+neither priest, nor peasant, nor layman so generally known and respected
+as the Rev Patrick O'Hara's two maiden sisters.  Miss Jane and Miss
+Mary they were known as generally, but among the young men and girls
+whom they loved, they were Aunt Jane and Aunt Mary always, and they were
+familiar figures at every gathering and every party for miles round!  If
+anyone was in trouble, they went over to the Parsonage at Omeath as soon
+as they could; and if they could not manage this, it was practically a
+certainty that the two little ladies would very shortly look in upon
+them.  The oldest inhabitants remembered them as two little girls, when
+their father was at the Parsonage before their brother; and later, as
+two very pretty, very charming young women, but why they were still at
+the Parsonage, and still the Misses O'Hara, was the one thing nobody did
+know.  Certainly, they had been very much admired, and there had been
+some talk about Miss Mary and young Captain Quinn, of Omeath Park, but
+nothing had apparently come of it, for the Captain went away on active
+service, and came no more to Omeath.  Several months after he left, both
+the sisters had gone abroad, and been away a year, but no one knew where
+they went to, and they never offered any enlightenment on the point.
+When they came back, however, they were very changed in many ways.
+Gaiety, which had been spontaneous before, seemed to have become an
+effort to both of them, and for some little time neither appeared to
+care to accept the invitations showered upon them as usual.  Later on
+something of their old brightness came back, and they were once more the
+familiar figures everywhere that they had previously been.  But though
+their joyousness came back, there was still an indefinable change and
+the suggestion of something hidden which none could solve, and to every
+one's surprise each "would-be" suitor was sent resolutely away.
+Finally, it became evident that the Misses O'Hara meant to remain the
+Misses O'Hara to their dying day, and live at the Parsonage as long as
+it was possible--the dearest little pair of old maids that ever gave
+their fellow-creatures cause to bless the Guiding Hand, that gave some
+women to one home and one family, and reserved others to belong to every
+one about them.
+
+"My dear," they said to any of the myriad nieces who plied them with
+wondering questions why they had never married, and whether it was that
+they did not believe in matrimonial happiness, "there is no happiness in
+the world quite like that of a happy wife and mother, but it is not
+given to everyone to know it, and many come to a crossway in life, where
+they know they must mould their future without any hope of it.  But for
+such, the Good Father has another happiness waiting, if they will take
+it and trust Him, and not repine because they might not choose.  It is
+the happiness of a life filled with serving, and rich in the love of
+one's fellow-creatures of every sex and age and station.  Our lives are
+filled to overflowing with, this happiness, and we are content to
+believe that what is lost to a woman in this life will be made up to her
+an hundredfold in some other life beyond."
+
+"And then there is Jack!" one of them would add softly, and the other
+would reply with like softness, "Yes, sister, there is Jack."
+
+By which one can easily gather, how, when the poor little baby at the
+Parsonage was left motherless at ten months old, he at once became the
+fortunate possessor of two new mothers, who would have gone through fire
+and water rather than let a hair of his sunny curls be hurt.
+
+"We must not spoil him, sister," Jane, the elder, had said once, as they
+stood gazing rapturously at their new treasure.
+
+"No, sister," Mary had replied, "it is only unkind mothers who spoil
+children, and so unfit them for the rough usage of the world and rob
+them of many a good friend they might afterward have won."
+
+"That is exactly my view, sister; we will endeavour to act up to it, and
+yet make him as happy as the day is long."
+
+Nevertheless, a more spoilt boy than little Jack O'Hara it would have
+been difficult to find, and, if Nature had not blessed him particularly
+with a nature proof against spoiling, he would probably have grown up
+the reverse of the adored young scamp he was.  But then, possibly, it
+was just this that caused his aunts to swerve so widely from their fixed
+principle, for it would have required a heart of cast-iron to withstand
+such a boy as he.  All his naughtiness was pure love of mischief, and he
+was always so genuinely sorry and penitent afterward, and so forlornly
+unhappy when he was in disgrace, that he made every one else in the
+house feel miserable until he was forgiven.  No sooner was he undergoing
+a term of punishment than Aunt Mary would ask Aunt Jane to forgive him
+this once, or the cook would "make so bold" as to plead with Miss Jane,
+or the gardener would "mention it respectfully to 'is riverence."
+
+"I think, perhaps, we might let him off just this time," one of the
+aunts would say, anxiously looking at her sister, and the other would
+reply gravely, "Yes, just this time, perhaps, but we must not do it
+again."
+
+And if there happened to be anything he particularly wanted, much the
+same proceeding ensued.
+
+"I'm afraid we mustn't let him have it sister!"  Miss Mary would say
+wistfully.  "We mustn't spoil him, must we?"
+
+"No, sister, we mustn't spoil him," would be the reply with like
+wistfulness.
+
+"Or, do you think, perhaps, just this once, sister?" half timidly.
+
+"Well, perhaps, just this once," with a show of reluctance, "only it
+mustn't happen again, must it?"
+
+"No, certainly not, sister, another time we will be firm for his good."
+
+And so it went on for twenty-four years, and always "another time" was
+reserved for firmness on Jack's account, until "life" took the matter
+into her own hands, and threw an obstacle across his easy, flower-strewn
+path, that even his devoted aunts could not smooth away for him, and
+over which he must needs prove himself a man and fight his own battle.
+But of that anon.
+
+"My dears, we have had some news!" began Miss Jane, "and we think you
+will be pleased, so we came across at once to tell you."
+
+"Yes," murmured Miss Mary, nodding her small head gravely while her
+sister spoke, to show that the sentiment was equally hers, "we thought
+you would be pleased."
+
+By this time, Jack and Paddy were again seated on the table, swinging
+their feet, in front of the two little ladies who sat side by side on
+the sofa looking rather like two little Dutch dolls.  Eileen had
+returned to her window seat, where she could keep one eye and one half
+of her mind on the mountains, and the other eye and the other half for
+more mundane reflections.
+
+"News!" exclaimed Paddy, clasping her hands ecstatically.  "Oh!
+scrumptious; I just love news!" while Eileen and Jack looked up
+expectantly.
+
+"We have heard from Mrs Blake this morning, and they are coming back to
+Mourne Lodge," continued Miss Jane, while Miss Mary, looking very
+pleased, murmured "Yes, coming back."
+
+"Hurray!" cried Paddy, "Hurray!  Hurray!  Just think of the dances and
+picnics and things.  Why don't you say you're glad, Jack--or do
+something to show it?"--and before he quite realised it, she had caught
+him by his coat and pulled him half round the room.  Roused instantly,
+Jack proceeded to pick her up and deposit her in the corner behind the
+sofa, amid frantic struggles on his victim's part and a general flutter
+of the two little ladies to protect anything breakable in their
+vicinity.  This, indeed, they did, partly from force of habit, for it
+was a standing joke in their circle that whenever Paddy and Jack were in
+the room together, Miss Jane kept her eye on one half of the room and
+Miss Mary on the other, and at the first symptoms of one of their
+customary "rough and tumbles," one little lady fluttered off collecting
+breakables from one side and standing guard over them, while the other
+little lady did likewise on the other side.
+
+"It's all right!" said Jack, seeing their alert attitude, "I was only
+teaching her not to take liberties with my coat.  Did you ever see such
+a scarecrow?" looking with delighted relish at Paddy's generally
+dishevelled appearance as she emerged from her corner.  "You'd think she
+ought to make a fortune with a face like that as an artist's model for a
+comic paper, wouldn't you?"
+
+"My dear, he's very rude," said little Miss Mary, patting the
+dishevelled one's hand.
+
+"Yes, aunt, but he can't help it, and we have to be kind to people's
+failings, haven't we?  It is something to be thankful for that you have
+been able to keep him out of an asylum so long, isn't it?" and then she
+ducked hastily to escape a shower of missiles, and the two little ladies
+flew off once more to the breakables.
+
+Order being again restored, however, the news was further discussed, and
+the three young people learnt with varying degrees of eagerness that
+Mrs Blake intended both her girls to "come out" the next winter, and
+that Lawrence Blake, the only son, was going to remain at home for a
+time.  This last piece of information contained in a measure the gist of
+the whole for the young people, but they each received it differently.
+Eileen turned her head, and with a slight flush in her cheeks gazed
+steadily across the Loch.  Jack looked as near being annoyed as he felt
+at all warrantable, or as his insistently sunny face would permit, and
+Paddy, screwing an imaginary eyeglass into her eye, remarked in a drawl,
+"Remarkable! really remarkable!  You are a credit to your charming sex."
+
+"In whatever capacity was that?" asked Jack, as if he marvelled.
+
+"Never mind," retorted Paddy; "because you have not the discernment to
+know a good thing when you see it, you need not suppose every one else
+is similarly afflicted.  How delightful it will be to have a _man_ among
+us again.  One gets so tired of boys!"
+
+"You don't mean to say you're going to uphold Lawrence Blake!" he
+exclaimed, apparently too disgusted to parry her thrust.
+
+"Why not?" stoutly.  "I'm sure he's a most superior young man."
+
+"A pity he's such a conceited ass, then," muttered Jack, at which the
+two little ladies looked pained, and while one said gently, "My dear
+Jack, you must remember he is always extremely nice to us," the other
+echoed with like gentleness, "Yes, Jack, dear, remember he is always
+nice to us."
+
+"Then I'll say he's a thundering good chap," was the ready response;
+"though that man or woman living could be other than nice to you passes
+my comprehension."
+
+"Of course they couldn't," put in Paddy; "why I want to hug both of you
+every ten minutes whenever I am with you.
+
+"Fancy if every one else did!" she ran on, "and our feelings got the
+better of us!  How should you like it, aunties, if every one wanted to
+keep hugging you every time they saw you, and couldn't help themselves!
+You would never dare to wear your best bonnets at all, should you?--and
+I expect your caps would be everywhere but on your heads, or else would
+have a perpetually rakish tilt."
+
+The two little ladies smiled without the least resentment, for they had
+long known that the varying angle of their caps was a source of great
+amusement to their large army of nephews and nieces, who stoutly
+maintained that when Aunt Jane's cap slipped awry, Aunt Mary's quickly
+did the same of its own accord, and _vice versa_, and therefore, it was
+more often the cap's fault than the owner's.
+
+Jack, however, stood up promptly, and pulling himself to his full
+height, said, with a whimsical recollection of childhood, "Shall I be a
+man, aunties, and spank her?"  This highly amused both little ladies, as
+it reminded them of a little mischievous girl who had pushed over her
+sister on purpose, and a sturdy, blue-eyed boy, who had promptly asked
+with a fiery resoluteness of purpose, "Shall I be a man, aunties, and
+spank her?"  It was memorable also how disappointed he had been when
+told that "being a man" never meant spanking little girls at all, even
+when they were mischievous.
+
+He would, doubtless, not have waited for any verdict on the present
+occasion, only just then the hearty old General entered the room, and
+Paddy, the father's darling, flew to him for protection.  A general
+chattering and laughing ensued, and, presently seeing her opportunity,
+Eileen rose from her seat in the window, and with a curious subdued glow
+in her wonderful eyes glided silently from the room.
+
+A few minutes later she was pulsing up the mountain with a free, eager
+step that not only proclaimed her an experienced climber, but bespoke a
+deep delight in thus climbing to the upland solitudes alone.
+
+"I say, daddy," Paddy was saying, "isn't it ripping, we're going to have
+a man-about-town here!  The real, genuine thing, you know, eyeglass and
+all, and as _blase_ as they're made.  Won't Jack look like a countrified
+Irish lout with bats in his belfry!"
+
+The General said afterward, it was nearly as good as a bit of
+Tipperary's extra-special, best Orangemen night.
+
+CHAPTER THREE.
+
+EILEEN THE DREAMER.
+
+There was one spot on the mountains near The Ghan House where, if you
+climbed high enough and were not afraid of an almost perpendicular path,
+you could get a glorious view, not only of the Loch and mountains, but
+of a wide stretch of sparkling silver, or dreaming turquoise, which was
+the sea.
+
+It was here that Eileen Adair loved to sit and dream dreams and weave
+romances, such as only the true Celt knows how.  What she put into them
+was known to none, and, indeed, probably never could be known, for they
+possessed that unfathomable, mysterious, yearning quality which is so
+present in Celtic blood, and were of those hidden thoughts and things
+which defy words to express them.  Not that Eileen ever wanted to
+express them.  She had not as yet met a kindred soul whom she felt could
+in any wise understand, and meanwhile, having the mountains, and the
+lake, and the sea, for companions, it did not seem that she needed a
+listener.  She could talk to these in a rapturous silence as she could
+talk to no other, and feel that her spirit was one with their spirit,
+and that what men call "solitude" is in reality a wealth of deep
+companionship for those who have eyes to see and ears to hear.  There
+was a good deal of the pagan about Eileen, for, though she always went
+to church, and tried to be earnest and attentive, it seemed so much
+easier to her to worship out in the open air among the upland solitudes
+of the mountain.  And so real and intense to her in these solitudes was
+the consciousness of an All-pervading God-presence, that fear of any
+kind was impossible, and she was less lonely than under any other
+conditions.
+
+It was doubtless these solitary climbs and silent musings, when she
+either thought deep, mysterious thoughts, or sitting motionless,
+absorbed into all her being the spirit of beauty around, that had
+deepened in her face year by year its dream-like loveliness.  Eileen was
+rarely gay, but her smile was indescribably beautiful and impressed
+everyone who saw it.  Paddy was her father's darling, and had been, in
+spite of his disappointment, ever since he learned that his second child
+was another girl and not the fondly longed-for boy.  With a sense of
+vain regret he had looked dubiously at the small bundle with the cause
+of his regret somewhere inside it, and retired without further
+inspection.  A few days later he got a full and uninterrupted view of an
+ugly little brown face, with a pair of particularly bright eyes, and a
+suggestion of roguishness that was entirely alluring.  "Bedad!" he said,
+looking back into the bright eyes, "I badly wanted a boy, but you look
+as if you'd be the next best thing."  And that was how Paddy got her
+self-chosen nickname.
+
+The General was, however, very proud of Eileen, though
+half-unconsciously a little afraid of her.  But what she missed in her
+father Eileen found amply in her mother, whose only fear was that she
+might worship this sweet-eyed, fair-faced daughter too much.  Mrs Adair
+was a woman with whom few ever felt quite at home.  Distinguished in
+bearing, and still with the remains of considerable beauty, she was in
+general an object of awe to her acquaintances.  Those who once got to
+know her and were admitted into her friendship ever after loved her
+dearly--but these were few and far between.  Foremost among them were
+the little ladies at the Parsonage, who had been waiting at The Ghan
+House to welcome their old friend's bride the day he brought her home
+from India.  She had been just the same white-faced, reserved woman
+then, and for a little while they had been non-plussed; but one day a
+letter from India had told them her story, and soon afterward the three
+women had cemented a lifelong friendship in tears of common sympathy.
+
+"I hear General Adair has married Miss Brindley and is taking her to
+your neighbourhood," the letter had run.  "She was governess with a
+friend of ours in India, and we know her well and are very fond of her.
+Do all you can for her; she has had a very sad life, and lately, on the
+top of all the rest, saw her love killed before her eyes guarding her
+from a band of Afghans on the frontier.  He was a cousin of General
+Adair's, and they were very devoted to each other, and the latter nearly
+lost his life also going to their assistance.  Afterward he fell in love
+with Miss Brindley himself, and we helped to persuade her to marry him,
+because she was so friendless, and poor, and broken-hearted."
+
+This, then, surely had something to do with the wistful expression in
+the little sad-eyed Eileen's face, and in later years so deeply entwined
+her round her mother's heart.  Only Mrs Adair rarely showed it, for she
+was eminently a just woman, and in the peaceful waters of her after-life
+she put her sad past resolutely aside, and tried to live only for the
+husband who was so good to her, and for her harum-scarum tom-boy
+daughter, as much as for the child who would always possess the largest
+share of her heart.
+
+But Eileen's eyes were not sad when she hurried up the mountain on the
+day the Misses O'Hara called with their piece of news.  She carried a
+small packet of sandwiches and a flask which the cook had hastily
+prepared for her, and revelled inwardly at the prospect of at least five
+hours all to herself.  She knew they would not be anxious at home, for
+both she and Paddy often took their lunch with them and vanished for a
+day, though it must be confessed nothing in the world would ever have
+induced the latter to waste an afternoon, as she would put it, mooning
+about on the mountains alone.  No, Paddy would be off in the yacht,
+fishing or sailing, with or without Jack, or she would be away to Newry
+for tennis, or to Greenore for golf, or to Warrenpoint to see her great
+friend, Kitty Irvine, and listen to the Pierrots on the front; and in
+any case no one would dream of worrying about her, for had she not
+possessed a charmed life she must surely have ended her short career in
+some sudden fashion long ago.
+
+But to-day it was not the five hours only that lit that glow in Eileen's
+eyes.  It was something quite different--quite apart, indeed, from the
+whole tenor of her life, except for a few short months three years ago.
+
+That was the summer when Lawrence Blake, instead of going off to foreign
+climes as usual, remained at his home, Mourne Lodge, a beautiful place
+in the mountains about two miles from The Ghan House.  He kept his yacht
+that summer moored by the General's landing-stage, so each time he went
+out in it he passed through the grounds of The Ghan House, and one of
+his sisters usually ran in to fetch Paddy or Eileen if they chanced to
+be at home.  Paddy, as it happened, much preferred the greater
+excitement, not to say danger, of taking her pleasures with Jack O'Hara,
+so it usually chanced that Eileen went in the Blakes' boat.  In the
+middle of September Kathleen and Doreen Blake had to go back to Paris,
+where they were still finishing their educations, but somehow it had
+seemed perfectly natural for Lawrence still to go down to his yacht and
+for Eileen to keep him company.  On the first occasion Jack and Paddy
+went with them, but an indefinable, strained feeling, owing doubtless to
+Jack's antipathy to the wealthy, polished University man, had caused the
+lively pair to come to the conclusion that it was too tame a proceeding
+altogether, and they could better amuse themselves elsewhere.  In this
+decision Lawrence and Eileen were secretly glad to acquiesce, for there
+was never any peace for anybody when Paddy was on board.  She would not
+sit still herself, nor let anybody else if she could help it, and was
+altogether a most dangerous young person to take on a small sailing
+yacht.
+
+So sweet September glided into a sunny, warm October, and still Lawrence
+went through the grounds to the bay and Eileen met him at the water's
+edge.
+
+To him she was a beautiful girl with poetical ideas, which he found
+rather amusing.
+
+To her he was a revelation.
+
+In all her nineteen years Eileen had never met any one so cultured as
+Lawrence Blake, except Jack's father, and he, since his wife's death,
+had grown so reserved and retiring that no one was able ever to bring
+him out of himself.  There seemed to be nothing that Lawrence did not
+know and had not studied, and so eager was she to learn from him that
+she was blind altogether to the defects which made him an object of
+aversion to honest, outspoken Jack.  It must be confessed, however, that
+Lawrence, when he liked, could be as charming a companion as any one
+need wish, and if it so pleased him, and he were not too lackadaisical,
+could make his way into almost any one's heart.  It was generally said
+of him that he had the most disarming smile in the world, and from
+wearing a cynical, morose expression, could change in an instant to a
+polished courtier if he so wished, and turn an enemy into an ally after
+half an hour's conversation.
+
+And it pleased him during that sunny October to stand well with Eileen.
+He liked her.  She was not only beautiful to look at, but interesting to
+talk to, and a delightful listener, and for the rest--well, what harm in
+it?
+
+So it chanced in the end that a certain subdued love-light drove much of
+the usual wistfulness from Eileen's eyes, and when unoccupied she would
+steal oftener to the mountains or sit longer in the starlight on her
+favourite seat by the Loch.  Her mother watched her a little anxiously,
+but feared to do harm by speaking.  Paddy treated it all as a great
+joke, and Jack, without in the least knowing why, felt a quite
+unaccountable longing to duck Lawrence in the bay whenever he heard him
+mentioned.  Then suddenly Mr Blake died, and everything was changed.
+Lawrence, being very fond of his mother, rarely left her in her terrible
+grief.  Finally, by the doctor's advice, he took her abroad, and the
+beautiful, hospitable house was closed, to the loss of the whole
+neighbourhood.  That was three years ago, and now they were coming back
+once more, and it seemed likely that the old _regime_ would recommence.
+
+To Eileen it was simply "he" was coming back.
+
+She told the birds about it as she hastened up to her beloved nook, and
+the little trickling streams, and the flowers, and the mountains that
+towered all round.
+
+She was so sure he was coming back to her.  Had he not lived in her
+thoughts and been the central figure of her dreams ever since he went
+away three years ago?  Was it likely it could have been otherwise with
+him, after the way he had looked at her and sought her companionship?...
+And now he was to love her so much more than before, for had she not
+read and thought and studied, to make herself a fitter companion?  She
+smiled to think what a little ignoramus she must have seemed to him
+three years ago.  Of course she was that, compared to him, still, but
+she had at least tried to educate herself to a higher plane and knew
+that she had not tried altogether in vain.  "Will he know it at once, I
+wonder?" she whispered to herself, sitting in her favourite attitude,
+with her elbows on her knees and her chin sunk deep in her hands, gazing
+at the deep blue of the distant sea.  "Will he be glad?  Is he feeling
+as I feel now?--as if Heaven had somehow come down to earth and shed a
+new loveliness over the mountains, and the valleys, and the sea?--as if
+one must always be good because of the joy in the world, and make
+everyone so happy that evil must eventually die out?"
+
+Then she fell to dreaming golden dreams of love, and wonder, and
+tenderness, till her eyes shone, and losing all consciousness of time
+and space her soul carried her away into an unreal dreamland of ecstasy.
+
+From this she was somewhat suddenly and forcibly awakened by the
+apparition of a stalwart form, not in the least ethereal or dream-like,
+with a gun on his shoulder and two brace of snipe in his hand.  He had,
+moreover, emerald green on his stockings, a tan waistcoat, and a pale
+green tie instead of a terra cotta one that had raised such objections
+in the morning; and whatever Paddy or anyone else might like to say, he
+formed as pleasing a picture of a typical young Briton as any one need
+wish.  He expressed surprise at seeing Eileen, but not being a good
+actor, any experienced ear would easily have detected that he had come
+to that spot with the express hope of finding her.
+
+"Have you been up here long?" he asked, throwing down the gun and the
+birds in the heather and telling his spaniel to keep guard over them.
+
+"About three hours, I should think," she replied, looking a little
+askance at the gun.  "Is it unloaded?"
+
+"Yes.  You're not afraid of it, are you?"
+
+"N-no," slowly.  "Isn't it rather early to shoot snipe?"
+
+"Yes, but there wasn't anything else."
+
+"I thought you and Paddy were going across to Rostrevor this afternoon?"
+
+"So we were, but we fell out."
+
+"Has Paddy gone alone, then?"
+
+"Yes.  She said she'd rather swim across than have to go in the same
+boat with me."  And he smiled at the recollection.
+
+Eileen smiled vaguely also, but she was not listening very attentively,
+so she was not quite sure what she was smiling at.  She had
+unconsciously slipped into her old attitude again, and, chin in hand,
+was gazing out to sea.
+
+Jack, having thrown himself down beside her, pulled at the heather in
+silence, watching her secretly.  "What do you think about when you sit
+here by yourself?" he asked suddenly.  "It seems as if it must be so
+awfully slow."
+
+"Oh, no, it isn't at all slow," she answered simply.
+
+"But what do you think about?" he reiterated.
+
+"I don't think I could explain," slowly, "except that it's just
+everything."
+
+There was a short silence, then he said:
+
+"You and Paddy are very different, aren't you?"  And she smiled as she
+answered in the affirmative.
+
+"I shouldn't think sisters are often so different," he went on.  "Aunt
+Jane and Aunt Mary are almost exactly alike.  There isn't much
+difference between Kathleen and Doreen Blake, either," he added, as if
+leading up to something, and then blurted out a little awkwardly, "I
+suppose you're very glad they're coming back?"
+
+"Yes," Eileen replied simply; "aren't you?"
+
+Jack did not reply, but remarked instead:
+
+"I don't suppose Lawrence will stay at home long.  This place is much
+too tame for him."
+
+Eileen only gazed fixedly at the distant sea.
+
+"I can't say I think it will be much loss to the neighbourhood,"
+continued outspoken Jack.  "He does fancy himself so."
+
+"I don't think he does," she said.  "It is only that the people about
+here do not appeal to him in some way, and so he stands aloof."
+
+"We're not clever enough, I suppose; but we could give him points in a
+good many things, all the same," a little savagely, biting at a piece of
+string with his strong white teeth.  "What has he ever done beyond
+taking a few degrees at Oxford?"
+
+"You haven't even done that."  And Eileen turned to him suddenly, with
+serious eyes.  She was the only one of all about him who ever took him
+to task seriously about his idle life.  His aunts were too fond and too
+indulgent, his father too wrapped up in his books and his loss, and
+Paddy, being as irresponsible and happy-go-lucky herself, only thought
+about the good time they were having in the present.  Eileen, however,
+saw further, and sometimes tried to influence him.
+
+He was silent now before the veiled reproach in her words, but
+presently, with an irresistible little smile, he said.
+
+"You wouldn't have me go away and leave Aunt Jane and Aunt Mary weeping
+over my empty chair and old shoes and things, would you?"
+
+"Perhaps you will have to go some day," she said.
+
+"Yes, but why worry about it now?  Sufficient unto the day--"
+
+"Yes; only you are wasting your best years."
+
+"Oh, I don't think so, and I'm not doing any harm to anyone."
+
+"You may be harming yourself."
+
+"How?"
+
+Eileen gazed dreamily before her, and presently said:
+
+"You see, I don't think life is altogether meant to be just a playtime
+for anyone.  We have to make our five talents ten talents."
+
+"But not all in a great hurry at the beginning."
+
+"It is possible to put things off too long, though."
+
+"That's what Paddy said because I kept her waiting nearly half an hour
+this afternoon.  She was very uppish," and again he smiled at the
+recollection, and Eileen gave him up.
+
+"You are quite incorrigible," she said.  "I might as well try and
+inspire Kitty," and she patted the spaniel, now curled up beside them.
+
+"Perhaps, but it really isn't worth while to worry now, it is?
+Everything's so jolly, it would be a pity to spoil it.  You're so
+serious and solemn, Eileen.  Paddy never bothers her head about any
+mortal thing--why do you?"
+
+"I expect I'm made that way.  It would not do for everyone to be the
+same.  Shall we go home now?  We shall be just in time for tea."
+
+He got up at once and shouldered his gun, starting ahead of her to clear
+the brambles and stones out of her path, and turning to give her his
+hand where the descent became difficult.  Had it been Paddy they would
+have scrambled down at a breakneck pace together, and he would have
+given no thought at all to her progress, for the simple reason that she
+would only have scorned it if he had.
+
+But Eileen, somehow, was different.  She was really quite as good a
+climber as Paddy, and probably a much surer one, but on the other hand
+she seemed more frail and dependent, and Jack liked helping her, even
+though he knew she would get along quite as well by herself.
+
+At the lodge gates they met the two aunts, and Eileen was promptly
+carried off to the Parsonage to tea, the two little ladies at once
+commencing to pour into her sympathetic ears an account of the sad fate
+of one of their favourite cats as they went along.
+
+"My dear, when we started out this afternoon," began Miss Jane, "we
+heard a most heartrending cry in the bushes, and after hunting about, we
+found such a pitiful object.  It was scarcely recognisable even to us."
+
+"Not even to us," echoed Miss Mary sadly.
+
+"It was actually poor dear Lionel, one of Lady Dudley's last kittens,"
+continued Miss Jane, "and what do you think had happened to him?"
+
+"Was he caught in a trap!" asked Eileen.
+
+"Oh, far worse," in a tearful voice.  "Mary and I are feeling terribly
+upset about it."
+
+"Yes; quite upset," came the sad echo.
+
+"Has he singed the end of his tail?" asked Jack with due solemnity, "or
+has Lady Dudley been giving him a bad time because he stole her milk as
+usual?"
+
+"Worse, my dear Jack, worse still," with a mournful shake of both heads.
+"He has fallen into a barrel of tar."  And the two little ladies stood
+still suddenly, to further impress the terrible nature of the calamity.
+
+"Oh, Christmas!" exclaimed Jack, unable to resist laughing, while Eileen
+asked most anxiously, "But he got out again?"
+
+"Yes, my dear, but think of the poor darling's condition!"
+
+"What a home-coming!" said Jack irrelevantly.
+
+"He was coated all over with tar," went on Miss Jane, now addressing
+Eileen only, and ignoring Jack with contempt, "and he had tried to clean
+himself, and of course, in licking his fur, had swallowed a lot of tar."
+
+"Actually swallowed it," put in Miss Mary on the point of tears.
+
+"And of course he was in a dreadful state, and probably in great pain,
+so we put him in a basket and took his straight away to Dr Phillips."
+
+"Tar must be very indigestible," murmured Jack.
+
+"And did he cure him?" asked Eileen kindly.
+
+"Alas, no: he said nothing could be done for him at all, and the kindest
+thing would be to poison him at once."
+
+A big tear rolled down Miss Mary's cheek.
+
+"Poor Lionel," she murmured tenderly.
+
+"_We_ buried him ourselves," finished Miss Jane, "under the cedar tree,
+as close to the churchyard gate as we could put him."
+
+"Much better have put him by the rhubarb," said Jack, for which Eileen
+frowned at him over their heads, but instead of being in the least
+ashamed of himself, he looked up at the clouds and murmured feelingly:
+"Lady Dudley has still five living--let us be thankful for small
+mercies."
+
+CHAPTER FOUR.
+
+PADDY'S ADVENTURE.
+
+Meanwhile in a very ruffled frame of mind, not only because Jack had
+kept her waiting half an hour, but also because she knew he had gone off
+quite contentedly up the mountain to look for Eileen, when he found he
+was in disgrace with her, Paddy trimmed her sail and sped across the
+Loch to Rostrevor.  There was a fairly strong breeze, and the management
+of the boat kept her busy, but when she landed at Rostrevor alone, she
+had time to further anathematise Jack in her heart, and was in two minds
+about going up to the Hendersons at all.  They had arranged to come over
+for tennis, but somehow Paddy did not think she wanted to play.  She
+felt as if she wanted to work off her ill-humour by doing something
+daring, that would take her out of herself.  So it happened that she
+stood on the quay irresolute and looked out to sea.  Her quick eye was
+taking note of the wind and the tide, while her brain considered the
+advisability of taking a little trip toward Greenore.  One half of her,
+the wise half, said, "Don't go; the wind is too choppy."  The other half
+said coolly, "All the more fun!  At the worst it would only mean a
+ducking, as you can keep near enough to the land to swim ashore."  Then,
+however, came the thought that Jack would certainly find out she had
+given up the tennis because of him, and feel ever so pleased with
+himself.  That, of course, would never do.  Whatever she had to put up
+with in the way of tennis was better than giving Jack such a triumph
+after his behaviour.
+
+"I guess I'll do both," she said, "and I'll tell Jack it was the finest
+tennis I ever had in my life."
+
+Consequently she made fast the painter, reached her racquet, and made
+her way briskly to the Hendersons, meaning to play one set and then get
+back to the boat and have her sail.
+
+Directly she appeared, she was hailed with a chorus of delight, and was
+instantly claimed for a partner by four or five different players, from
+whom she calmly made her choice like a young queen.
+
+"I'm not going to play with you, Harry Armstrong," she said, "because
+you poach too much.  Nor with you, Dick, because you're so slow--you
+always reach the ball a second too late, and it's bad for my nerves.
+And Basil Whitehead won't be serious enough.  I guess I'll play with
+you, Bob," and she nodded to a shock-headed schoolboy of about fourteen,
+all arms and legs, and feet.
+
+"How just jolly, thundering fine!" he exclaimed excitedly.  "You are a
+brick, Paddy; we'll knock them into a cocked hat, won't we!"
+
+"You know the other girls here are such awful sillies," he remarked to
+her confidentially, as they walked toward a vacant court.  "A fellow
+can't have half a good time with a set like this.  They're no better
+than a pack of schoolgirls," and he turned up his snub nose
+contemptuously.
+
+"Oh, well, of course! when a `man-about-town' like you comes along,"
+said Paddy, "we all feel horribly countrified and shy and awkward.  It's
+only natural, living away out here among the mountains."
+
+"I suppose so," said Bob, hesitatingly, not quite sure whether she was
+laughing at him or not.  "Still," brightening up, "they might be more
+like you if they tried.  You know I think you're just an awfully jolly
+girl," he finished with great condescension.
+
+Paddy made him a mock bow.  "I'm sure I feel highly honoured," she said,
+"but you mustn't tell the other girls, or they'd be frightfully jealous,
+and hate me like anything."
+
+"Well, you needn't mind that," he replied stoutly.  "I'll look after
+you, and settle them pretty quick if they're cheeky."
+
+"That's all right, then.  Let's set to work and win this set, because I
+have an important engagement directly after tea."
+
+Bob's face fell a little at this, but he quickly decided to make the
+best of the prevailing good, and not worry about what came next.
+
+But Paddy did not get away quite so quickly as she had intended, as
+Kitty Irvine came and pulled her on one side to tell her an important
+piece of news in confidence.
+
+"Have you seen him?" she exclaimed in an eager undertone.  "Isn't he
+perfectly scrumptious?"
+
+"Seen who!" asked Paddy in bewilderment--"Who's perfectly scrumptious?"
+
+"Why, Colonel Masterman's nephew, of course.  You must have heard about
+him?"
+
+"The Mastermans at Carlingford?" still unenlightened.
+
+"Yes, Colonel Masterman has a nephew come to stay with them, from
+London.  Fancy you not knowing!"
+
+"Well, I think I did hear Jack say something about it; but I had quite
+forgotten.  When did he come?"
+
+"Only yesterday, but he was in Newry this morning, and bought a picture
+post-card at the same time that I did."
+
+"Ump!" expressively.  "I loathe picture post-cards.  He must be a
+nincompoop, if he actually buys them."
+
+"Not at all," asserted Kitty.  "He's probably going to send them home.
+He's not exactly handsome, but he has got the loveliest smile, and such
+a nice voice."
+
+"Rubbish!" exclaimed Paddy, whose ill-humour was still not very far-off.
+"A man with a lovely smile and a sweet voice is always a silly ass.  I
+expect he curls his hair, and wears patent-leather boots, and lavender
+kid gloves."
+
+"You're very cross," from Kitty in an aggrieved tone; "I thought you'd
+be pleased to hear there was likely to be some one fresh at the tennis
+parties, to talk to."
+
+"So I should be if they were jolly, but I'm sure this man isn't.  He
+sounds just awful.  I loathe him already."
+
+Kitty was silent for a moment, then she asked suddenly, "Where's Jack?"
+
+"I don't know," with a fine air of indifference.  "He was so long
+getting ready, that I just came across without him.  I must go back now,
+as I'm alone, and if the wind gets up, I mightn't be able to manage the
+boat.  Say good-by to Mrs Henderson for me--she's just in the middle of
+a set," and without waiting for more, she slipped away unobserved, and
+hurried down to the water's edge.
+
+Loosening her boat quickly, she sprang in and pushed off, the light of
+an adventure glowing in her eyes.
+
+"Now to `breast the waves,' as Eileen puts it in her poetry," she said
+gleefully, and headed for the open sea.
+
+For about half an hour everything went well, in spite of the continued
+freshening of the breeze.  Paddy trimmed her sail in a masterly fashion,
+and felt so elated that she quite forgot her grievance of the afternoon,
+and sang little "coon" songs to herself from joyousness.
+
+Two or three times she met some old skipper who knew her well by sight,
+and shouted a word of warning, about the breeze being very stiff out
+beyond the bay--but she only called back a friendly good-day, and held
+on her way.
+
+As she neared Greenore she met another boat, not much bigger than her
+own, which a young man was sailing, like herself, single-handed, and as
+they passed he watched her with no small wonder.  He had himself started
+off at mid-day in spite of various warnings concerning the choppiness of
+the wind, but being a first-rate yachtsman he had no fear, and had even
+gone out into the open sea beyond Greenore.  When, however, he met this
+other small skiff, handled only by a mere girl, he could hardly believe
+his own eyes, and could not help staring hard to make sure he was right.
+
+"Upon my word!" he ejaculated mentally--"these Irish girls have some
+pluck,"--but he instinctively loosened his sail, and let it flap idly,
+while he turned with a half-anxious expression to watch her movements.
+
+Paddy, already intoxicated with excitement, and what she had already
+achieved, was becoming more and more rash; and when a sudden strong gust
+caught her sail and nearly capsized her, the occupant of the other boat
+gave a muttered exclamation, and prepared at once to turn round, with a
+vague idea of hanging about in her vicinity.
+
+He had scarcely got his bow toward her, when a second gust, a still
+stronger one, caught her before she had quite recovered from the last,
+and in less time than one can write, her boat was upside down, and she
+herself struggling in the water.
+
+"Hold on to the boat," shouted a voice near at hand; "I'll be with you
+in a few seconds."
+
+Paddy's first idea had been to swim for the shore, but at the sound of
+the voice, she was glad enough to turn and cling to her capsized boat,
+though with no small wonderment that anyone should be so near.
+
+Then she recognised the little yacht bearing down on her, and saw that
+the occupant must have turned some minutes before, and probably been
+watching her.  A moment later he was helping her up the side, and she
+stood before him, like a half-drowned rat--with the water pouring off
+her in all directions.
+
+For one moment they looked at each other silently, not quite sure how to
+proceed, and then the humour of the situation became too much for Paddy,
+and she burst out laughing, he immediately following suit, quite unable
+to help himself.
+
+"What in the name of wonder do I look like?" she said, glancing down at
+her dripping skirt, and the streams of water all round.
+
+"A little damp!" he suggested, and they laughed again.  "But you must be
+awfully plucky and awfully rash," he added, not without admiration.
+
+"Oh, yes!  I'm all that," asserted Paddy; "but I've got a charmed life,
+so it doesn't matter.  I must look perfectly awful, though," and she
+laughed again.
+
+"Not at all," gallantly; "but I'm afraid you'll take cold.  Do you live
+near?"
+
+"Only at Omeath, but we shall have to tack, so it will take rather a
+long time."
+
+"I should think so," impressively.  "We'll go into Carlingford, and I'll
+take you to my aunt's to get some dry clothes."
+
+"Who is your aunt?" asked Paddy, inwardly admiring the skill with which
+he managed his boat; and not a little also his broad shoulders and
+frank, pleasant face.
+
+"Mrs Masterman, at Dunluce."
+
+"Goodness!" she exclaimed in surprise, without stopping to think.  "Are
+you Colonel Masterman's nephew who came yesterday?"
+
+"Yes, why?" looking up curiously.
+
+Paddy found herself in a fix, and she flushed crimson, feeling ready to
+bite her tongue out for being so hasty.
+
+"Why?" he asked again, in a way that made her feel she must answer.
+
+"Only that I heard something about you this afternoon," she stammered.
+
+"And what did you hear?"
+
+His grey eyes had an amused twinkle in them now, and there was something
+so disarming about his smile; that with an answering twinkle in her own,
+Paddy looked at him slyly and said:
+
+"Oh! nothing much--only that you bought picture post-cards."
+
+CHAPTER FIVE.
+
+TED MASTERMAN.
+
+"Was that all?" asked Ted Masterman, reaching across to tuck his
+rain-proof coat, which he fortunately had with him, closer round her,
+and looking still more amused.
+
+"Not quite, but it's all I'm going to tell you," said Paddy.
+
+"Oh, no, it isn't," with a smile; "you're going to tell me the rest."
+
+"How do you know I am?" archly.
+
+"Because people always have to do what I want them to."
+
+"How very odd!" in feigned surprise; "that is exactly how it is with
+me!"
+
+"So I should imagine," looking into her laughing eyes with growing
+interest.
+
+"That's pretty of you," she said, "so I'll go on.  I was told you had a
+lovely smile."
+
+"Someone was a kindly judge then.  I wonder what you said."
+
+The twinkle in Paddy's eyes literally shone.
+
+"I said that if you bought picture post-cards and had a lovely smile you
+must be a nincompoop."
+
+Ted threw his head back and shouted with laughter, exclaiming, "That's
+the best of all, and I quite agree with you!"  Then they ran up against
+the landing-stage, and he hurried her out of the boat and along the road
+to his aunt's as fast as she would go.
+
+"My dear child!" was all Mrs Masterman said, when she saw her, and
+without another word bustled her off upstairs, and flew to prepare a hot
+bath.
+
+"It's nothing new," she explained in answer to Ted's queries later,
+shaking her head drolly.  "She's just the wildest harum-scarum that ever
+breathed, and her father positively delights in it.  I must take you to
+call.  He'll laugh himself nearly ill over this escapade, but for my
+part, I think he would do better returning thanks for the multitudinous
+times she has been given back to him, from the very gates of death."
+
+"But she wouldn't have been drowned to-day, aunt.  She could have swum
+ashore."
+
+"She might have had cramp, or caught her death of cold, or a hundred
+other things.  It's dreadful, to my thinking, for a girl to be so
+absolutely a boy in everything.  But there! she's young yet, and I
+daresay she'll improve by and by."
+
+Ted, standing at the window with his hands in his pockets, staring
+across the Loch, had an odd, inward conviction that there was no room
+for improvement, but this he kept to himself, asking instead of her
+father and home.
+
+A little later, he made their acquaintance, as his aunt decided to keep
+Paddy all night, and sent him to The Ghan House with a note of
+explanation.  Jack and Eileen were just returning from the Parsonage as
+he arrived, and while Mrs Adair read the note aloud to the General, out
+on the lawn where they were sitting, the two young people sauntered up.
+
+"Lord love us!" exclaimed the General gleefully; "was there ever such a
+girl before!  Capsized, did she?--right out by Greenore!--managing the
+boat alone, too!--and out there a day like this--by my faith a
+good-plucked one!  Here, Jack! you young scoundrel! why weren't you out
+with Paddy this afternoon?  Here she's been getting capsized right out
+by Greenore and fished out of the water by this young man, while you
+were wasting cartridges trying to hit snipe.
+
+"Here's my hand, sir," turning to Ted and giving him a hearty
+hand-shake, "and an old soldier's thanks and blessing, and if there's
+anything I can do for you at any time just name it.  Lord! what a girl
+she is!" he finished, and held his sides and shook with laughter.
+
+Meanwhile Mrs Adair added her thanks in a low, eager voice, asking
+anxiously after Paddy's welfare; and Jack took stock of the stranger
+generally.
+
+When he had finished reassuring Mrs Adair concerning her daughter, and
+reasserting that he had really done nothing at all deserving of thanks,
+Ted returned Jack's scrutiny with almost as great interest, wondering if
+this handsome young Irishman were Paddy's brother.
+
+"Let me introduce you to _my_ eldest daughter," said Mrs Adair.
+"Eileen, this is Mr Masterman from Dunluce."
+
+Eileen shook hands with her usual charming smile, and then Mrs Adair
+introduced Jack, who, after a little further scrutiny, started on his
+favourite topics of shooting and sailing, and finding Ted as interested
+as himself, they quickly became good friends.
+
+"Your daughter called out something about returning in the morning," Ted
+said to Mrs Adair, as he prepared to leave.  "Some fishermen have been
+out for the boat this afternoon, so very likely she will return in it."
+
+"Perhaps you will accompany her," said Mrs Adair at once.  "_We_ shall
+be delighted to see you to lunch if you will."
+
+Ted thanked her and accepted the invitation gladly, then hurried back
+with various portions of Paddy's belongings to Carlingford, hoping
+vaguely that she might have insisted upon getting up and coming down to
+dinner.  Manlike, he had quite forgotten she could hardly appear without
+a dress, and he felt quite unreasonably disappointed when he found the
+table only laid for three, and he and his uncle and aunt sat down
+together.
+
+"I took the precaution of locking Paddy's door," Mrs Masterman
+remarked, as they sat down.  "I know what a terror she is to manage, and
+after such a wetting it is most important that she should remain in bed
+for the rest of the day."
+
+She had scarcely finished speaking when an apparition in the doorway,
+clothed in an assortment of odds and ends of borrowed garments, and with
+a face wreathed in smiles, remarked: "I wish roses hadn't thorns.
+Coming down the spout was child's play, but the beastly thorns on the
+rose creeper have quite spoilt my elegant hands."
+
+Mrs Masterman's arms went up in horror, but the depressed rescuer was
+instantly all smiles likewise, while he made room for her in his seat.
+
+"If you'd known me as well as my own father does," Paddy replied to her
+hostess' expostulations, "you'd as soon have thought of putting me down
+the well, as locking me in a `common or garden' bedroom.  There's always
+a spout, or a coping, or a bow-window with leads, or something.  How do
+you do, Colonel Masterman?" extending her hand graciously.  "I couldn't
+be expected to stay upstairs, with such delicious odours coming from the
+kitchen, could I now?"
+
+"Why, of course not, of course not," exclaimed her host, who vied with
+her father in enjoying all her adventures; "you must be very hungry
+after such an adventure."
+
+"I should just think I am--_ravenous_!"
+
+"But my dear, there is a tray all ready for you, and I was just going to
+send your dinner upstairs."
+
+"I know you were, and you are very sweet and kind, but I've got an odd
+failing about meals.  I simply can't eat, however hungry I am, if I'm
+alone.  It's quite terrible, you know," looking abnormally serious.  "I
+might be ready to eat myself with hunger, and if I'm all alone I
+couldn't take one single bite."
+
+"A lucky thing for yourself," laughed Colonel Masterman, "though not,
+perhaps, for anyone who chanced to be with you--for you'd be quite
+certain to begin on them first."
+
+"It would depend upon who it was, and if they were nice and plump."
+
+"Oh, my dear," exclaimed Mrs Masterman in a shocked voice; "what a
+dreadful idea!"
+
+"Then we'll change the subject," said Paddy, adding roguishly, "Do you
+like picture post-cards, Mr Masterman?"
+
+"I think people are very wanting in taste and very out-of-date who
+don't," he answered promptly; "but perhaps in an out-of-the-way place
+like this you have not yet seen many?"
+
+"On the contrary," sweetly, "we have seen so many that we are positively
+sick of the very sight of them.  I'm thinking of starting a society,
+like the one in New York, for suppressing the tune called `Hiawatha,'
+only mine will be directed against the post-card craze."
+
+"But I think they are so beautiful," said Mrs Masterman, looking up
+from her plate with a puzzled expression.  "Really! sometimes I can
+hardly tear myself away from Linton's, they have such beautiful
+specimens."
+
+"No?  Well, you must take Mr Masterman with you to-morrow.  He'll
+simply love it, and he won't know how to tear himself away either.
+Colonel Masterman will have to come by the next train to try and lure
+you both home again."
+
+Ted Masterman's expression had a "wait-till-I-catch-you" air, but she
+only went off into an airy description of her youthful admirer on the
+tennis court, which lasted until the two elder ones retired to their
+books, leaving her and Ted to amuse each other over their coffee in the
+conservatory.  Paddy at once opened fire with a cross-examination.
+
+"So you live in London?" she remarked; "seems to me one might as well
+live in a coal mine."
+
+"Oh, come! that's rather strong; London is a grand place."
+
+"It's a good thing you think so, since you live there.  I loathe the
+very name of it."
+
+"But why?"
+
+"Why?  Everything's why.  Look at the dirt, and the smoke, and the
+smuts," in a tone of unutterable disgust.  "On a fine day the poor sun
+struggles to shine through the atmosphere, and only succeeds in giving a
+pale, sickly glow, and on a wet day the clouds appear to literally rest
+on the house-tops and rain-smuts.  If you look up, you see nothing but
+roofs and chimneys, and if you look down, you see nothing but
+paving-stones and basements, and if you look round generally, you see
+little else but pale, sickly, tired people all trampling on each other
+to live."
+
+"Didn't you ever look in the shops?"
+
+"Yes, and I got so sick of them, I just longed to go inside the windows
+and jumble everything up into a heap anyhow, and then write a big 1
+shilling 11 pence farthing over the whole lot.
+
+"The only thing I really enjoyed," running on, "was the front seat on
+the top of an omnibus, with a talkative driver.  That was always funny,
+whether he discoursed on politics, or religion, or the aristocracy; or
+expressed himself forcibly on motor-cars and the `Twopenny Tube.'  Do
+you use the Tube much?"
+
+"Nearly every day of my life."
+
+"Goodness!--and you still live!  Don't you think Dante must wish he had
+thought of a Tube for his Inferno?  It must be like Heaven to come here
+and sniff our lovely mountain air all day long.  I wonder you don't go
+about with your nose in the air too busy sniffing to speak."
+
+"It reminds one of what one might imagine Heaven, in various ways," he
+said, with smiling innuendo.
+
+"Eileen and mother might stand for the angels," she ran on, "and Jack
+for the prodigal son or penitent sinner."
+
+"And where would you be?"
+
+"Well, I guess I'd be most useful helping Saint Peter keep the door,"
+looking wicked, "but perhaps I shouldn't be admitted at all.
+
+"Not but that I'd stand as good a chance as Jack," she finished with a
+decisive air.
+
+"Is Jack Mr O'Hara?"
+
+"Yes.  He lives at the Parsonage next door to us."
+
+"And you've known him all your life?"
+
+"Every single bit of it.  I can remember hitting him in the face, and
+kicking at him generally, as soon as I can remember anything."
+
+"Then I suppose you've made up for it all since."
+
+"Oh, dear no! except to hit harder as I grew stronger."
+
+"He's very handsome," said Ted a little thoughtfully.  "He's Irish,"
+replied Paddy promptly.
+
+"Ah, yes!  I forgot," slyly; "it covers a multitude of sins, doesn't it,
+to be Irish?"
+
+"We usually call them virtues!" she rapped out, quick as lightning, and
+then they both laughed, and a moment later the Colonel was heard calling
+to them to come and play Bridge with him.
+
+The following morning they sailed back together, and Ted was made to
+remain, much to his delight, for the rest of the day.  They played
+tennis all the afternoon, and then, after having tea on the lawn, rowed
+across the Loch to Warrenpoint to listen to the Pierrots.  When they
+came to sit quietly, however, everything did not continue quite so
+smoothly.  Jack had been playing tennis with Paddy most of the
+afternoon, because it made more even games, but now he manifested a
+marked desire to talk to Eileen, just as Ted, who had been playing with
+Eileen, wanted now to talk to Paddy.  With the usual contrariness of
+events, Eileen was perfectly indifferent which of the two she talked to,
+but Paddy, a little upset by her old playfellow's growing predilection
+for her quiet sister, wanted to talk to Jack.
+
+The time had hardly come yet for Paddy to realise just why she was
+upset.  She only knew that Jack somehow stood alone in her little world,
+and felt vaguely that no future could be happy without him.
+
+For a little while she succeeded in keeping the conversation general,
+but as Eileen grew more and more dreamy, and Jack silent, she finally
+tossed her head, told them they were the dullest pair she had ever the
+misfortune to be out with, and went for a walk along the front with Ted.
+
+Meanwhile, left to themselves, Jack again introduced a certain topic
+constantly in his mind.
+
+"The Blakes came back to-day," he said suddenly; "they crossed last
+night."
+
+Eileen gave a little start, and was silent a moment.
+
+"How do you know?" she asked at last.
+
+"Barrett, at the station, told me they were in the boat train."
+
+"How many of them?" trying to speak naturally.
+
+"All, Mrs Blake, Kathleen, Doreen, and Lawrence."
+
+There was a pause, then he added, "I suppose Lawrence has just come to
+settle them in."
+
+Eileen remained silent.  The news had taken her by surprise, as she had
+not expected them for a week or two, and she felt her pulses throbbing
+oddly.
+
+Then an unaccountable presentiment that Lawrence was somewhere near took
+possession of her, and, making some excuse about feeling cold, she got
+up to follow Paddy and Ted Masterman along the front.  Jack, wishing
+very much to remain as they were, was obliged to get up also, and they
+walked briskly in the direction of Rostrevor.
+
+They had not gone far before Eileen caught her breath a little, at the
+sight of two figures coming toward them.
+
+Nearer they came and nearer, the girl chatting merrily, and the man
+listening with languid amusement.  Eileen felt herself watching--
+watching--for the upward glance, the recognition, the pleased greeting.
+
+They were almost together now--he looked up--the recognition came
+instantly, but a second later, Lawrence Blake had raised his hat and
+passed on with a bow.
+
+CHAPTER SIX.
+
+LAWRENCE BLAKE.
+
+While Paddy and Jack were sitting on the table a week previously,
+swinging their feet and discussing the news of the Blakes' home-coming,
+just brought by Aunt Mary and Aunt Jane, Lawrence Blake, in his own
+special sanctum in Cadogan Place, lounged in a big arm-chair, and
+considered the interesting subject of his own boredom.  He was
+particularly bored with his mother and his two sisters.  Having seen a
+good deal of them in the last three years, he was anxious for a spell of
+existence without them.
+
+And now his mother wanted him to go across to Ireland with them before
+his projected tour to India.  And it was so beastly damp and dull in
+Ireland--so altogether unpleasant.  Then there would be this tiresome
+"coming-out" dance of the girls; such a fatuously idiotic idea to have a
+preliminary "coming-out" at home, and then repeat it in grander measure
+in London.  He didn't mind going out of his way occasionally to please
+his mother, but to be bothered with Doreen and Kathleen was too much to
+expect.  To his august personality they were so young, and crude, and
+foolish.  He told himself he was bored to death with their aimless
+vapourings, and this time he must really follow his own inclinations,
+and let them go to Ireland without him--at which decision he got up
+leisurely, and prepared to stroll round to the club.
+
+But almost at the same moment, the door opened, and a soft voice said,
+"Are you here, Lawrence?"
+
+An antique Egyptian screen of beautiful workmanship hid the interior of
+the room from the door, and it was not until an intruder had passed it,
+he could tell if the room were occupied or not.
+
+"I am," replied Lawrence casually; "but I am just going out."
+
+Mrs Blake closed the door and advanced into the room, seating herself
+in the big chair he had vacated.
+
+"I want you to come to Ireland with us," she began at once, with a note
+of persuasion in her voice.  "There is so much you ought to see to on
+the estate, before you start off again travelling."
+
+Lawrence remained standing on the hearthrug.
+
+"May I smoke!" he asked, with a mixture of indifference and courtesy
+that was entirely typical of him.
+
+His mother inclined her head, and looked anxiously into his face.
+
+It was, perhaps, noticeable that, in spite of his non-responsive manner,
+she in no wise appeared abashed, merely reiterating her request.
+
+But then who should know a man better than his mother, if she happen to
+have been blessed with discernment?  With Lawrence and Mrs Blake this
+was emphatically the case, hence the direct opening of the subject,
+without any preliminary leading up.  Mrs Blake knew when she came to
+the smoke-room that he had made up his mind not to go; she knew that he
+would be politely unresponsive and calmly difficult.  As a matter of
+fact, he almost always was, but she had found that directness was better
+than any amount of circumvention, and, though he could not be driven, he
+could just occasionally be led.
+
+"Why do you want me to go?" he asked.  "It only causes dissension, and
+you know more about the estate than I do."
+
+"Perhaps.  But I ought not.  Do you never intend to take it in hand?"
+
+"I did not think of doing so, until most other things had failed."
+
+She was a clever woman, who had won through a good deal of stress and
+difficulty, with a husband she adored and a son she worshipped, both of
+whom had been what is generally described as "peculiar tempered."  If
+she had cared for either of them less, the home would have been
+pandemonium.  Fortunately for all concerned, her love had stood every
+test, and her natural cleverness had been content to expend itself on
+tactfully managing her male belongings.  The people who had only a
+superficial insight, and were at considerable pains to pity her, might
+have saved their sympathy.  Mrs Blake was eminently no object for
+condolence.  A clever woman must have some outlet for her cleverness,
+and why not direct it toward managing two interesting, if difficult,
+specimens of the male sex?  If she truly loves them, what could be more
+engrossing, and what reward more enthralling, than the intervals of
+devotion and tenderness won by consummate tact?  Certainly, these had
+never been missing; both men, below the surface awkwardness and
+obstinacy, unswervingly returned her devotion.
+
+It was the other members of the household who suffered generally, and
+felt aggrieved at the male belongings with which they had been saddled.
+It was in allusion to this that Mrs Blake now remarked:
+
+"Kathleen and Doreen would not quarrel with you, if you spared them your
+sarcasms."
+
+"Kathleen and Doreen are silly little fools," coldly.
+
+"It is only that they don't understand you," she told him, "and you must
+remember they are very young.  Of course you often aggravate them
+purposely, when you are not pointedly indifferent to their very
+existence, and they are quite justified in resenting it."
+
+"Then why not let well alone, and go to Ireland without me?"
+
+"This dance is to be a sort of family affair, and I want you to be
+present."
+
+He shrugged his shoulders, and his thin, clever face broke into a
+half-satirical smile; "You don't want me to aggravate the girls with my
+presence, but you want me to be there.  Couldn't I please you best by
+promising to be there in spirit?"
+
+"Why don't you want to come?" ignoring his flippant air.
+
+"Why do you want to go?" he retaliated.
+
+"We have been absent so long and I must bring the girls back to town for
+the winter.  It is a good opportunity to put in two months there."
+
+"My dear mother, Mourne Lodge has got on so nicely without us for three
+years, it will quite safely manage to exist until July.  I dislike
+rushing about needlessly.  In an age of exclamation stops and
+interrogation marks, couldn't you support me in trying to be a semicolon
+for a little while?"
+
+She smiled, but refused to humour him.
+
+"You are to come, Lawrie," she said, getting up, "and you are to try and
+be nice to the girls.  Perhaps if you were to forget they were sisters?"
+significantly.
+
+"They will not allow me to.  No one but sisters would go out of their
+way to be so persistently aggravating."
+
+"Except a brother," with a little smile.
+
+"Perhaps; but the brother, you must remember, is not always there from
+choice."
+
+"Well, you won't see much of each other in Ireland, as they will be out
+all day with their own friends.  Come, Lawrence--put up with us for a
+few weeks longer; your companionship will mean so much to me."
+
+And it was then one of those swift and sudden changes transformed his
+face, as it had done the face of his father, and made everything worth
+while.  He bent down with a look of fond amusement, and kissed her
+forehead.
+
+"I don't know why in the world I went to the trouble of making up my
+mind not to come," he said; "I should have saved my energy, realising
+that a wilful woman always has her way."
+
+Mrs Blake smiled a little wistfully, and moved toward the door, which
+he hastened to open for her.  She was thinking if only she could conjure
+up that lightning smile, with its extraordinary charm, a little oftener,
+or if only he would--
+
+But what was the use of expecting Lawrence to be rational and
+considerate.  Had he ever been?  He was tired of gaiety, yet he hated
+monotony.  Tired of idleness, yet indifferent to his estate.  Tired of
+flirting, yet averse to considering marriage.  Full of latent
+possibilities of achieving, that he was too indolent to develop.  She
+hoped someone, or something, would sting him alive some day, but at
+present he persisted in adopting the _role_ of the _blase_ looker-on,
+and no one appeared to have any influence over him whatever.
+
+For his part, left alone, Lawrence once more sank into the roomy,
+inviting-looking chair, instead of going out, and watched his cigarette
+smoke with a cogitating air.
+
+He was thinking of Eileen Adair.
+
+She had probably grown prettier than ever since he last saw her, and he
+had an artist's appreciation of beauty.  He was glad that she would be
+there.  Her high-flown idealistic sentiments would probably be somewhat
+boring, but, on the other hand, she was simple and natural, with a
+simpleness and naturalness that were decidedly refreshing for a change.
+And then there was that young fool, Jack O'Hara, at the rectory, who
+could look such outspoken dislike, and seemed to develop rather a sudden
+fancy for Eileen whenever Lawrence was winning her smiles, and he,
+himself, overlooked.  It would be rather amusing to annoy him.
+
+Yes, since he must go to humour his mother, he was glad Eileen would be
+there.  They would go on where they left off for a little while.  He was
+not quite sure at what stage that was, but it involved many very sweet,
+serious upward glances from a pair of exceedingly beautiful eyes, and
+some enlightening on his part that was entertaining, because so
+surprising.  Of course he would be circumspect, and not intentionally
+mislead her.  He would, in fact, make a point of shocking her, partly
+for her own sake, and partly, because, when a girl became fond of him,
+she usually bored him to extinction at once.  After which, he once more
+got up and prepared to go to the club.
+
+"I shall not be in to dinner," he told the butler as he went out, having
+forgotten to mention the fact to his mother, and half an hour later he
+was making a fourth at bridge at a table called the Monte Carlo table,
+because the players always played for specially high stakes; and, except
+with an interval for dinner, would continue until the early hours of the
+morning.
+
+And on the mountain side, Eileen was dreaming, and Jack was trying to
+fathom her, and both were alike in vain.
+
+CHAPTER SEVEN.
+
+LAWRENCE FINDS EILEEN ON THE SHINGLES.
+
+For several paces after the encounter at Warrenpoint, neither Jack nor
+Eileen spoke, and though he tried hard to see her face, she kept it
+resolutely turned from him toward the Loch.
+
+"Is Mr Blake's friend someone staying with them?" she asked at last.
+
+"I expect so," he answered.  "I don't remember ever seeing her before."
+
+Eileen was feeling a little sick and dazed, so when they met Paddy and
+Ted Masterman, she suggested at once that they should return home, and
+Paddy, feeling irritated with things in general, agreed with alacrity.
+
+"Oh, by the way," she remarked later, as they were going up to bed, "Mr
+Masterman and I met Lawrence Blake with that Harcourt girl, who used to
+stay with them.  She's a cousin or something, don't you remember?
+Lawrence used to say she could talk as fast as three ordinary women in
+one, but that as she never expected to be answered, it was rather a
+rest, because you needn't listen.  That's how he looked to-night; as if
+he were taking a rest."
+
+"Are you sure it was Miss Harcourt?  I didn't recognise her."
+
+"Quite sure.  She looks very different with her hair up, that's all.  I
+should have stopped them, but I heard her say they were very late, and
+they seemed in a hurry, so I didn't."
+
+Eileen turned away in silence, but a weight was lifted off her mind.
+
+The following day, as she was sitting reading by the water, while Jack
+and Paddy were out fishing, a firm step on the shingle suddenly roused
+her, and Lawrence himself approached.
+
+"How do you do?" he said, with a pleasant smile.  "I came down here
+before going up to the house, rather expecting to find some of you such
+a beautiful afternoon."
+
+Eileen shook hands simply, with the usual greetings, but a lovely flood
+of colour, that she could not control, spread over her face, and was
+noted with a certain amount of gratification by Lawrence's experienced
+eye.
+
+"It's pleasant to be seeing old friends again," he said.  "May I sit
+down?"
+
+She moved to make more room for him, and asked at once after his mother
+and sisters.
+
+"Mother is very well," he said, "and the girls are full of frocks and
+hair-dressing.  There's to be a big dance next month, and I suppose I
+shall have to stay for it."
+
+"Were you going away again, then?"
+
+"I rarely stay long anywhere," a little ambiguously.
+
+"Have you decided where to go?"
+
+"Not quite.  I shall not decide until a few days before starting, I
+expect.  But how is everybody at The Ghan House?  Does his lordship of
+the rectory hate me as cordially as ever?  I see Paddy has not yet
+managed to get herself transported to a better clime."
+
+While Eileen replied to his questions, her slender white hands played a
+little nervously with a flower, and her deep eyes fluttered between the
+distant mountains and her companion's face.  She felt he was studying
+her, and knew there was admiration in his eyes, and her heart felt
+foolishly glad.
+
+"Have we been away three whole years?" he said presently.  "How strange!
+It seems like three months now I am back.  Shall I find everyone as
+unchanged as you, Eileen?"
+
+"I am three years older," she said, with a little smile.
+
+"Yes, but there are some people to whom the years make very little
+difference.  I think you are one of them."
+
+"Yet I feel different."
+
+"How?" looking at her keenly.
+
+"It wouldn't be easy to describe.  It is just different, that's all,"
+and she gazed a little wistfully toward the mountains.
+
+"I expect you are getting too thoughtful," he said.
+
+"You ought to go away somewhere, and see something of the world outside
+these mountains."
+
+"I am very fond of the mountains," she told him simply.  "I don't want
+to go away.  I do not think any place could be as lovely as this."
+
+"That is where you are wrong.  I acknowledge the scenery among these
+mountains is very beautiful, but there are heaps of equally and indeed
+more beautiful places in the world.
+
+"The only thing is one gets tired," relapsing into a languid manner,
+that Eileen could not but see had gained upon him during his absence.
+"I'd give something not to have seen, nor heard, nor learned, more than
+you have.  To have it all before me, instead of all behind."
+
+"But surely,"--leaning forward with ill-concealed eagerness--"the future
+is just brimming over with interest and possibilities for you."
+
+"Why for me particularly?"
+
+"I was thinking of your brains, and your money, and your position--why
+you have everything to make life interesting."
+
+He shrugged his shoulders, and the expression on his thin cynical mouth
+was not pleasant.
+
+"Oh, I don't know about that.  It's too much bother altogether.  I've
+seen behind the scenes too much to care; it's all rather rotten at the
+core, you know--everything is."
+
+Eileen looked pained, and gazed away to her beloved mountains.  "I am
+sorry you feel like that," she said simply; "it is all so beautiful to
+me."
+
+"Just at present perhaps--but by and by--"
+
+"I hope it will be, by and by also.  Anyhow, I shall still have my
+mountains."
+
+"And after all they're nothing in the world but indentations and
+corrosions on the crust of a planet, that is one in millions."
+
+There was a pause, then she asked slowly: "Is that how you look upon
+human beings?"
+
+"Yes, more or less.  You can't deny we are only like midges, coming from
+nowhere, and vanishing nowhere; or at best, ants hurrying and scurrying
+over an ant-hill.  `Life is a tale, told by an idiot, full of sound and
+fury, signifying nothing.'"
+
+"Ah, no! no!" she cried, turning to him with a beseeching look in her
+eyes.  "If that were so, where would be the use of all its sacrifices,
+and conquests, and nobleness?"
+
+"Where is the use of them?" in callous tones.
+
+She looked at him blankly a moment, then got up and walked to the
+water's edge, feeling almost as if he had struck her.
+
+After a moment he followed, and stood beside her, idly tossing pebbles
+into the water.
+
+"Take my advice, Eileen," he said, "and don't get into the way of caring
+too much about things.  It's a mistake.  Later on, your feelings will
+only turn, and hit you in the face."
+
+"And what is it your favourite poet, Browning, says?" she repeated half
+to herself--
+
+  "One who never turned his back, but marched breast forward,
+          Never doubted clouds would break,
+  Never dreamed though right were worsted, wrong would triumph,
+      Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better,
+          Sleep to wake."
+
+"It sounded well," he sneered.  "No doubt if I were to write a novel it
+would be full of beautiful sentiments that sounded well--and I should
+care that for them in my heart," and he snapped his fingers carelessly.
+
+She looked up and descried Jack and Paddy coming over the Loch toward
+them.
+
+"Here are the others," she said, almost with an air of relief.  "They
+have just seen us and are coming in."
+
+"Hullo!" cried Paddy, as they came within earshot.  "I hope your Serene
+Highness is well."
+
+"Very well, thank you," replied Lawrence, giving her his hand as the
+boat reached the landing-stage.  "I was just remarking to your sister,
+that you had not succeeded in getting yourself transported to a better
+clime yet!"
+
+"No, the old proverb seems to be reversed in my case, I am not too good
+to live, but too good to die."
+
+"Or else too bad, and so you are always getting another chance given
+you," remarked Jack.
+
+"Be quiet, Jack O'Hara, for the pot to call the kettle black is the
+height of meanness.  Come out of that boat and say `how do you do'
+prettily to this great man from abroad," and her brown eyes shone
+bewitchingly.
+
+Everybody in the neighbourhood teased Paddy, and Lawrence was no
+exception.
+
+"'Pon my soul!" he exclaimed with feigned surprise, "I believe you're
+growing pretty, Paddy."
+
+"Nothing so commonplace," tossing her small head jauntily.  "What you
+take for mere prettiness is really _soul_.  I am developing a
+high-minded, noble, sanctified expression; as I consider it very
+becoming to my general style of conversation.  Father thinks it is
+`liver,' but that unfortunately is his lack of appreciation, and also
+his saving grace for all peculiarities."
+
+"I should call it pique," said Jack, "if by any chance I was ever
+treated to a glimpse of anything so utterly foreign in the way of
+expressions, on your physiognomy."
+
+"Oh, _you_ wouldn't recognise it," was the quick retort.  "`Like to
+like' they say; and I never find it is any use employing anything but my
+silliest and most idiotic manner and expression with you.
+
+"But with Lawrence, of course," running on mischievously, "it is only
+the high-souled and the deeply intellectual that he is in the least at
+home with.  Witness his companion last night, with whom he was so
+engrossed he could not even stop and shake hands with old friends from
+cradlehood."
+
+"To tell you the honest truth," said Lawrence, "my cousin, Miss
+Harcourt, had got so thoroughly into the swing of some extraordinary
+harangue, which required nothing but an ejaculation every five minutes
+from me, and seemed to go delightfully on without any further attention
+whatever, that it would have been downright cruelty to interrupt such a
+happy state of affairs.  I knew I should be seeing you all to-day, and
+at the last moment my heart failed me.  I might add that the harangue
+lasted until we got home, and a final ejaculation on the door-step, with
+a fervent `by Jove,' satisfied, her beyond my best expectations.  If my
+life had depended upon it, I could not have told anyone what she had
+been talking about."
+
+"It must simplify life tremendously, to have such a perfect indifference
+to good manners," said Paddy, who could never resist a possible dig at
+Lawrence.
+
+To her, he was the essence of self-satisfied superiority, and she
+apparently considered it one of her missions in life to bring him down
+to earth as much as possible.  Lawrence found it on the whole amusing,
+and was not above sparring with her.
+
+"You are improving," he remarked, with a condescension he knew would
+annoy her; "that is a really passable retort for you."
+
+"I am glad that you saw the point.  I was a little afraid you might have
+grown more dense than ever, after being absent from Ireland so long."
+
+"Ah!  Lawrence Blake!" exclaimed a voice close at hand, as the General
+and Mrs Adair joined them from a side walk.  "How are you?  I'm very
+glad to see you back again.  We all are, I'm sure," and he bowed with
+old-world courtliness.
+
+Lawrence thanked him, and walked on a few paces with Mrs Adair to
+answer her warm inquiries for his mother and sisters.
+
+Afterward he told them about the dance to take place shortly, for his
+sisters' "coming out" and left Paddy doing a sort of Highland Fling with
+Jack round the tennis court to let off her excitement.  She tried to
+make her sister join in, but Eileen only smiled a little wistfully, and
+when no one was looking, stole off by herself to the seat down by the
+water, where Lawrence had found her in the afternoon.
+
+There she sat down and leaned her chin on her hand, and gazed silently
+at the whispering Loch.
+
+Was she glad or sad?
+
+She hardly knew.
+
+She could not forget the unmistakable admiration in his eyes, and yet--
+and yet--
+
+"Like midges coming from nowhere and vanishing nowhere, or wits hurrying
+and scurrying over an ant-hill," she repeated vaguely.  "Ah! he could
+not have meant that--surely--surely he could not...  For if so, what
+could one ant be to him more than another?"
+
+For a moment her heart was heavy, then she remembered his fondness for
+his mother and took comfort again.
+
+"It is only that someone or something has disappointed him," she told
+herself, "and it has made him bitter and cynical, but it is only a
+passing mood.  By and by he will change again, and perhaps I can help
+him.
+
+"Yes," her eyes glowed softly, "perhaps I can help him to find faith
+again, and to be happy instead of hard and indifferent."
+
+The stars came out and a crescent moon hung over the mountains.
+
+The night was gloriously beautiful--gloriously still--and a deep
+restfulness stole over her spirit.  In the deep, silent depths of her
+Celtic imagination, in which dwelt ever paramount, before all, that
+divine love of beauty which imbues a too often prosaic world with a
+vague wonder of loveliness, and fair promise, she saw only the heights
+to which men might rise, and the power of goodness, and held to her
+ideals in the face of all destroying.
+
+She was aroused at last by a step approaching over the shingle that was
+so like the step of the afternoon that she started and held her breath
+in wondering expectation.
+
+But it was only Jack, seeking for her with anxious qualms about the damp
+night air, and a certain glow in his eyes when he found her, which might
+have told her many things, had she had leisure to observe it.
+
+"You had better come in, Eileen," he said simply.  "It is too damp to
+sit by the water.  I have been looking for you everywhere; I was so
+afraid you would take cold."
+
+She got up at once, and with a murmured word of thanks, followed him
+silently to the house, still lost in a far-off dream of happiness.
+
+CHAPTER EIGHT.
+
+PADDY'S PIGS.
+
+A spell of beautiful autumn weather brought Lawrence often to the beach
+as of old to get his boat, but Kathleen and Doreen no longer accompanied
+him.  They were not asked, and had they been would have declined the
+honour.  A nameless feud was waging between the _dilettante_ brother and
+the two lively Irish girls, scarcely less wild than Paddy, who resented
+his cool superiority and cutting sarcasms to their inmost core.
+
+It did not interfere with anyone's pleasure, however, as they had hosts
+of friends all over the countryside, and Lawrence preferred having
+Eileen to himself.  It was hardly realised by the elders that with so
+many young folks about two should have much opportunity of being alone,
+or a little more discretion might have been shown.  They were all
+supposed to be out together, and probably were at the start-off, but a
+moment's thought might have suggested Paddy and Jack most unlikely
+occupants of Lawrence's trim yacht.
+
+However, they were mellow, dreaming days, and an atmosphere of peaceful
+dreaminess seemed to pervade them all--like the calm before a storm.
+
+To do Lawrence justice, he did not go out of his way to win Eileen's
+love.  On the contrary, he did go a little out of his way to shock her,
+but since she possessed divination enough to realise something of this,
+it had the opposite effect.  She was so simple and natural herself that
+she was incapable of understanding deception.  She believed Lawrence
+wanted her to know him at his worst--to know all the thoughts he
+harboured so directly opposed to her dearest beliefs--and so let her
+love him as he was instead of as she would have him.
+
+And the mere idea only stimulated her love.  Pained she inevitably was,
+but the offered up her pain at the shrine of Love, and went deeper into
+the maze.
+
+If Lawrence dimly perceived this, he blinded himself to it.  To him
+love-making was a very different process to this calm interchange of
+ideas, and he certainly refrained from much that he would not have
+thought twice about with any other pretty girl who interested and
+pleased him.  Could any more be expected?  No one could ever say he made
+love to Eileen.  He did not make love to her, but he sought her
+companionship beyond all other, and looked his admiration of her quiet
+loveliness, regardless that to such as she these delicate attentions
+were almost a declaration.  For the rest, a man must have something to
+amuse him, and her _naivete_ really was rather refreshing, and of course
+it wouldn't hurt her to learn a little more about the world generally
+from a less narrowed horizon.  So he sought her day by day, and made no
+further allusion to that projected Eastern tour, till Eileen forgot all
+about it, and waited in a dreaming ecstasy for her joy to take actual
+shape.
+
+The only two who seemed at first to scent danger were the harum-scarums,
+Paddy and Jack.  Such glorious days could not, of course, be wasted in a
+piffling little sail on the Loch or mooning on the beach, but there was
+time occasionally for a passing thought of the two who sailed and mooned
+so contentedly.
+
+"I can't think why Eileen doesn't pack him off," Paddy said once.  "He
+makes me want to stamp, with his calm superiority.  Fancy spending hours
+listening to the drivel he talks when she might be ratting with us,"--
+which somewhat remarkable comparison would no doubt have rather
+astonished the Oxford B.A.
+
+As a matter of fact, he was enlightened with it the following day, for
+while leaving The Ghan House to go home, he was suddenly knocked nearly
+silly by a flying, furious apparition, who charged into him round a
+sharp corner, carrying a blackthorn in one hand and a ferret in the
+other.
+
+For one second Paddy regarded him with unmistakable disgust for staying
+her progress, then her face suddenly grew excited again, as she
+exclaimed: "There! there, see, there it goes.  Come on--we'll have him
+yet," and dragging the astonished Lawrence after her, charged on down
+the hill.  "Here! you take the ferret," she gasped, "but mind how you
+hold him.  He bites like old Nick," and she thrust the offensive little
+beast into his hand.  Lawrence took it with as good a grace as he could!
+command, and when they ran the rat to earth exhibited a momentary
+enthusiasm nearly equal to hers.
+
+"There!" said Paddy, holding up the slaughtered vermin, with shining
+eyes.  "Wasn't that a good catch?"
+
+"Very.  What shall I do with this!" and Lawrence held up the ferret,
+with which he had again been unceremoniously saddled, with a comical air
+of martyrdom.
+
+"Put it in your pocket for the present," promptly "or are you afraid of
+spoiling the shape of your coat?" with a scornful inflection, as he
+looked vaguely disgusted.
+
+"You can put it so, if you like," he retorted, "though.  I have many
+other coats."
+
+"What's the matter with Peter?" eyeing the ferret affectionately.  "He's
+a beauty--if only he didn't bite so.  I'll take him, if you like.  Come
+along back to the barn and I'll find you another blackthorn.  You can't
+think what sport it is.  Fancy sitting in a spick and span little yacht,
+that could hardly turn over if it tried, and talking about stuffy,
+uninteresting people like Browning and Carlyle, when you might be
+_ratting_!"  Leading the way up the hill again.
+
+"Fancy!" ejaculated Lawrence.  "You must really take me in hand.  I'm
+afraid my education has been guided into foolish and worthless
+channels."
+
+"You needn't bother to be sarcastic," hurrying on, with her eyes eagerly
+on the barn.  "It's all wasted on me.  I know what's life and fun.  You
+only know a lot of useless stuff that someone thought about life a long
+time ago, I don't know how Eileen has the patience to listen to you.
+Come on,"--growing more excited--"Jack and Mr Masterman have evidently
+unearthed some more!"
+
+"I bow to your superior wisdom," with a little smile that made his face
+suddenly almost winsome, and straightway threw himself heart and soul
+into the ethics of ratting, noting with a slight amusement, the big,
+cheery Ted Masterman's evident predilection for the fair ratter.
+
+But it was over Paddy's adventure with the pigs that he won his first
+real spark of approval from her.
+
+Paddy and Jack had a great friend near by in the person of one Patrick
+O'Grady, who farmed a small farm with an Irishman's dilatoriness, helped
+therein by the two playmates.  Paddy had sown seed for him, ploughed,
+harrowed, and dug potatoes--Jack likewise--both considering it their
+due, in return, to be consulted on all matters pertaining to the farm.
+This was how it came about that Paddy was mixed up in the sale of the
+pigs.  She was at the farm when the disposal of those forty-five young
+pigs was discussed, and naturally took an active part in the impending
+decision.  It was finally decided they should be sold by auction at the
+next market, and Paddy should mingle with the crowd--Jack also, if
+procurable,--to run up the prices.  She also undertook to turn up the
+previous afternoon, bringing Jack with her, to help to catch the
+forty-five little pigs and put them in a wagon.  When they arrived on
+the day in question they were first of all regaled with tea by Patrick
+O'Grady's housekeeper, who was commonly called Dan'el, though whether
+from her transparent fearlessness of all things living, or because her
+enormous bulk was supported on feet that could only, under ordinary
+circumstances, belong to a big man, remains a mystery.  Paddy had once
+remarked that if you were out in a storm with Dan'el it didn't matter
+about having no umbrella, because if you got to the leeward side you
+were sheltered same as if you were up against a house, but that, of
+course, was a little of Paddy's Irish exaggeration.  Howbeit, having
+finished tea, the farmer piloted them all to the big barn into which he
+had driven the pigs ready for catching.
+
+"I thought we'd have 'em all together here," he remarked, "but 'tis a
+pity there's no door to close the entrance."
+
+"Never mind," said Paddy slyly, "Perhaps if there had been you couldn't
+have got them in."  At which Patrick scratched his head and looked
+thoughtful a moment before he replied:
+
+"Why, no, begorra!  I'd never thought o' that; but how's we goin' to
+keep 'em in whiles we catches 'em?"
+
+"We must have Dan'el," said Paddy promptly.  "She shall be Horatio and
+keep the bridge," whereupon poor Dan'el was duly installed to fill up
+the doorway with her accommodating bulk.  Then began a rare scrimmage.
+Bound, and over, and through dashed those young pigs, with Paddy and
+Jack and Patrick after them--shrieking with laughter--till Paddy finally
+leaned up against the wall on the verge of hysterics and begged for a
+halt.
+
+"Don't let me see Dan'el for a few minutes," she prayed Jack.  "Come and
+stand in front of me.  When I see Dan'el rolling about in that doorway,
+like a German sausage on a pivot, it makes me feel as if I should
+burst."
+
+By this time half the pigs were safely installed in the wagon, but this,
+instead of lightening their labour, considerably increased it, for the
+remaining half had more room to escape their pursuers.  Finally a farm
+youth was called in to help, and the work progressed until only a dozen
+remained.  A brief halt was again called, and then they all returned to
+the fray feeling refreshed.  Unfortunately the pigs were refreshed also,
+and had apparently taken advantage of the halt to concoct some plan of
+concerted action.  They slipped and scuttled between legs with a
+lightning speed that suggested a reinforcement of the devils of old
+time, until the moment came for the grand coup.  This consisted in a
+dash at Paddy's legs, which took her entirely by surprise and tripped
+her up, she emitting a shriek that made everyone pause a second to see
+if she was getting killed.  In that same second, while the moment of
+unguarded surprise still held their captors, another concerted rush was
+made for the mountainous apparition in the doorway.  The breach was
+carried gloriously.  Dan'el came down like an avalanche, and in the
+pandemonium that followed it was discovered she had entrapped one small
+pig under her person, and its shrill screams were mingled stridently
+with the helpless laughter of the outwitted captors.  Paddy lay on the
+floor, buried her face, and gave it up.  Tears poured down her cheeks,
+and for very exhaustion she could not look on while the two men, nearly
+as helpless as she, tried to hoist poor Dan'el on to her feet and
+release the screaming little pig.  They got her to a sitting posture,
+and then they had to take a rest while Jack leant up against the wall of
+the barn, hid his face on his arm, and shook with convulsive laughter.
+The pigs meanwhile, in a distant corner of the yard, held another
+council of war, squeaked and grunted their glee and awaited
+developments.  When Jack was moderately calm again, and Paddy
+recovering, Dan'el was finally hoisted to her feet and prevailed upon to
+do a little more entry blocking while the pigs were chased round the
+yard, and after a terrific hunt they were all safely collected in the
+wagon, ready to start for market at daybreak.
+
+So far all was well, but the next day Paddy's praiseworthy intentions of
+getting her farmer friend good prices did not have quite the result she
+had anticipated.  Again and again the clear young voice rang out with a
+higher bid, to be outdone satisfactorily by some pig-desiring Pat; but
+occasionally there was no higher bid, and then the pig was
+surreptitiously replaced among the rest, to be re-offered presently.
+How long, in consequence, the sale of pigs might have proceeded, it is
+impossible to say.  Jack, who was having a little fun on his own,
+sometimes mingled with the buyers, and disguising his voice, made
+careful bids after solemnly advising Paddy to go one higher, till a
+system of buying in and re-offering was in progress that seemed likely
+to last until doomsday.
+
+At last Jack came up to Paddy with an inquiring air.
+
+"What in the world are you going to do with fifteen pigs, Paddy?" he
+asked.  "I shouldn't buy any more if I were you."
+
+"I--buy--fifteen--pigs!" she exclaimed.  "What in the world--"
+
+"Well, of course, you have," he urged.  "They're all in the wagon
+waiting for you.  Patrick just asked me if you were going to drive them
+home yourself," omitting, however, to mention that he had previously
+impressed upon the doubtful Patrick that the pigs belonged to the fair
+buyer.  "After robbing him of purchasers, you can't very well leave them
+on his hands.  I don't suppose he'll want you to pay in a hurry, but you
+must take charge of them."
+
+Paddy regarded him with a haughty stare, and then turned to encounter
+the visibly perturbed Patrick.
+
+"They fifteen pigs, miss," he began hesitatingly.  "Are they to go to
+The Ghan House?"
+
+"They're not mine," she declared stoutly.  "I bought them for you."
+
+"Very good of you, miss; but what would I be wanting with 'em, when I be
+selling 'em?"
+
+Paddy looked perplexed.  "Whose in the world are they?" she asked
+doubtfully.  "They're not mine--and they're not yours--I give it up."
+
+"Begorra!  I'm shure I dunno, miss," and Patrick fell to scratching his
+head in great perplexity; "but it seems as if, seeing I sold 'em and you
+bought 'em--"
+
+"But I bought them for you."
+
+"But if I was selling 'em, how could I want for to buy 'em?"
+
+"If Patrick doesn't want them," put in Jack, "of course you must take
+them home, Paddy.  I'll help you drive them."
+
+"Oh! don't be an idiot!" stamping her foot.  "They don't belong to me."
+
+"But you've just said you bought them."
+
+"I didn't."
+
+"You did; you said you had bought them for Patrick."
+
+Paddy stamped her foot more impatiently still and grew more perplexed.
+
+"Share, and it's beyond me," and Patrick fell again to his
+head-scratching.  "If you bought 'em it seems as if they ought to be
+yours, don't it?"
+
+Paddy looked round with a worried air, and at that dreadful moment
+descried Lawrence, in the very act of dodging two small pigs that had
+escaped their owner and were making tracks back to the wagon as fast as
+they could go.  She signalled to him, and he came up at once.
+
+"I don't know what's happened to Newry," he said, "but every third
+person seems to have acquired a small pig.  I've been dodging them for
+the last half-hour.  They're all over everywhere."
+
+Jack began to chuckle in a most annoying manner.
+
+"Paddy's bought fifteen," he said.
+
+"I haven't.  Be quiet, you--you--great, silly clown."
+
+"Now, don't get cross, Paddy," soothingly; "and you've said so many
+times that you did buy them that it sounds dreadfully like a fib."
+
+Paddy looked as if she were not quite sure whether to laugh or cry, and
+Lawrence asked:
+
+"What's the matter, Paddy?  Why does he say you've bought fifteen pigs?"
+
+"It's just this way--" began poor Paddy.
+
+"The real trouble," put in Jack, "is that Patrick O'Grady doesn't know
+whether he's been _selling_ pigs or, buying them, and Paddy doesn't know
+whether she's been _buying_ pigs or selling them.  For the last two
+hours they've been doing both in a sort of cycle, and now they're left
+with fifteen on their hands, and we want a Solomon to say who they
+belong to," and he exploded again.
+
+"If you don't shut up, Jack--I'll--I'll throw a pig at your head," said
+Paddy furiously.
+
+"And I offered to help you drive them home," in an aggrieved voice.
+
+"I'll help instead," volunteered Lawrence.  "I'm a positive genius at
+pig-driving."
+
+"Or I could take them to The Ghan House on my way back," said Patrick
+cheerfully.
+
+"But they're not mine, I tell you.  I don't want the things.  What in
+the world could I do with fifteen pigs?"
+
+"They certainly wouldn't be very nice in your bedroom, and I don't see
+where else you could hide them," put in Jack.
+
+"Come, what's it all about?--don't mind him," as Paddy again looked
+furiously at her tormentor.  "Perhaps I can help?"
+
+Wherewith, turning her back on the delinquent, who continued to chuckle
+audibly, Paddy related the history of the fifteen pigs, and the Gordian
+knot she and Patrick had managed to tie between them.
+
+Lawrence had a good laugh--not the least at Paddy's mystified air as to
+whether she had bought the pigs or not--and then he nobly offered to
+solve the difficulty by taking them off her hands.
+
+"You can take them to the Mourne Lodge farm," he told the no less
+bewildered Patrick, "and call for the money in the morning."
+
+Paddy was instantly all smiles.  "And don't forget my commission, Pat!"
+she cried.
+
+"Your commission was for _selling_," was Jack's parting shot.  "You
+_bought_ these, so you can't claim it."
+
+"Let's all go and have coffee at the cafe," suggested Lawrence.  And ten
+minutes later Paddy and Jack were again chuckling uproariously over the
+relation of the whole episode from first to last.
+
+And it was then that Paddy, under the spell of a certain sense of
+gratitude, decided Lawrence was very nice when he liked, and, of course,
+if Eileen was growing to care for him, and thought she would be happy
+with him, it was no use worrying about things.  It was, of course, too
+much to expect that Lawrence could do other than love Eileen if she
+would let him.
+
+CHAPTER NINE.
+
+CONCERNING A SUPPER-DANCE.
+
+As the date fixed for the great dance drew near, no other topic of
+conversation was of any real interest.  Even the two little ladies at
+the Parsonage got quite excited over it, and confided to Paddy and
+Eileen one afternoon, that they were each having new dresses on purpose.
+
+"Oh! how splendid!"  Paddy cried ecstatically; "do tell us what they are
+like."
+
+"Black silk," said Miss Jane.  "And Honiton lace," added Miss Mary.
+
+"Lovely!" cried Paddy.  "I am certain you will be the belles of the
+ball.  No one will look at Eileen and me."
+
+"Nonsense, my dear," shaking her head; "two old things like Mary and
+myself belles of the ball indeed!  No, no; you and Eileen will be that,
+and we shall rejoice to see it."
+
+"Now you are sarcastic, auntie," shaking a threatening finger at her;
+"as if any belle of a ball ever had a sallow skin and snub nose like
+mine.  No, if I am a belle at all it will have to be from a back view
+only.  I really do think my hair is prettier than Eileen's, so with the
+front of her and the back of me, we ought to carry off the palm."
+
+"What about Kathleen and Doreen?" put in Eileen, "they have improved
+wonderfully."
+
+"Yes, and their dresses were bought in Paris.  It's not fair," and Paddy
+pulled a face.  "We all ought to have started equally with dresses made
+in Ireland."
+
+"My dear, dress makes very little difference," said little Miss Mary;
+"expression and manner are everything, and Kathleen and Doreen, though
+charming girls, are both a little stiff at present.  I haven't a doubt
+your programmes will be full almost before you are in the ball-room."
+
+"I guess so," said Paddy mischievously.  "I've promised twice the number
+of dances there are already, but as I've forgotten who they were all to,
+it doesn't matter.  I am thinking of arriving with two boards like a
+sandwich man, and on one side I shall have in large letters `Please note
+all previous engagements cancelled,' and on the other `Book early as a
+great rush is anticipated.'"
+
+The two little ladies laughed merrily, and then suddenly grew serious
+and looked at each other, as if preparing for some pre-arranged
+announcement.
+
+"My dears!" began Miss Jane, the spokeswoman, while Miss Mary nodded her
+head in solemn agreement.
+
+"Mary and I have each been looking through certain of our old treasures
+to see if we could find anything suitable to give you for this happy
+occasion, and we have decided upon the two fans our uncle, General
+Alvers, gave to us for our first ball in Dublin.  They are
+old-fashioned, perhaps, but they are very good and we hope you will
+value them for our sakes."
+
+"Yes, that is it, sister," murmured Miss Mary; "we hope you will value
+them for our sakes."
+
+"How good of you!" cried Paddy and Eileen together, and then Paddy flew
+straight at each little lady and hugged them both in turn.  When she had
+released them, Miss Jane rose and went to a drawer, and took from it two
+parcels which she slowly began to unfold.  At last, from enough tissue
+paper to have kept half a dozen fans in, she drew two beautiful
+hand-painted ivory ones, and presented them to the two girls.
+
+"Oh! lovely! lovely!" and Paddy was almost beside herself.  "But how can
+you bear to part with them!"
+
+"Are you sure you would not rather lend them?" asked Eileen gently.
+
+"No, my dear, Mary and I have thought it over, and we have decided it is
+folly to hoard up pretty things that might be giving pleasure to someone
+we love.  We had our time when we were young, and we were very happy,
+and loved pretty things as you do.  Now it is your turn, and we must sit
+and look on."
+
+"You seem to have been doing that always," exclaimed Paddy with a sudden
+burst, "just sitting and looking on at other people's happiness," while
+Eileen slipped a hand into little Miss Mary's with her slow sweet smile.
+
+"Oh, no, my dear," Aunt Jane answered at once, "we had just as gay a
+time as you and Eileen when we were your age."
+
+She paused.
+
+"And then!" said Paddy, with half-veiled eagerness.
+
+The two sisters looked at each other a moment, and then Miss Mary said a
+little nervously:
+
+"Not just yet, sister.  Some day, if they still care to know we will
+tell them, but not just yet."
+
+Eileen pressed the hand in hers with silent sympathy, while warm-hearted
+Paddy took the opportunity to administer two more hugs in the middle of
+which Jack entered and claimed that it was his turn next.
+
+"Look what aunties have given us," cried Paddy, ignoring his request.
+"Their own beautiful fans that they had for their first ball."
+
+Jack duly admired, and then asked what they were going to give him that
+they had worn at their first ball.
+
+"Hadn't you two sashes!" asked Paddy of the little ladies; "he could
+wear one round his waist, and one for a tie, and just think how pleased
+he would be, and how he would strut about in the ball-room, like a dog
+with two tails."
+
+"I'll strut you about in a few minutes," remarked the maligned one,
+"speaking of your elders and betters in that light fashion."
+
+"Betters!" echoed Paddy scornfully.  "Did you say _betters_?"
+
+"I did, Madam.  Do you mean to dispute it!"
+
+"It is so utterly silly, it is hardly worth while," and then she ducked
+hastily to avoid the missile aimed at her head, and a second later they
+were flying round the room after each other.
+
+Instantly there was a flutter of skirts, and the two little ladies were
+collecting breakables, while Miss Jane gasped to Eileen in a
+horror-struck voice:
+
+"The fans, my dear!  The fans!"
+
+Eileen rescued the two heaps of tissue paper with their precious
+contents, and then held the door open for Paddy to fly out.  The next
+moment they saw her scrambling over the wall between the two gardens,
+with Jack at her heels.
+
+Eileen remained with the two little ladies, and presently they all went
+down to the beach together.  Here they sat and worked, while Eileen read
+aloud to them, until they were disturbed by a footstep on the shingle
+and looked up to see Lawrence Blake approaching.
+
+Instantly, in spite of herself, a crimson flush dyed Eileen's cheeks,
+and an anxious look passed between the two little ladies.
+
+Lawrence came up with his pleasantest smile, and greeted all alike with
+his polished charm, and though the two little ladies had long felt an
+instinctive mistrust of him, they could not but be impressed, and
+received him graciously.  A boat was pulled up on the beach, beside
+where they were sitting, and with the same perfect ease, he seated
+himself upon it, and drew them into conversation.  For one moment they
+made an effort to maintain a formal atmosphere; but since it pleased
+Lawrence to be gracious, they could no more resist him than anyone else,
+and almost before they knew it, they were deep in an eager discussion on
+the picture galleries of Europe.
+
+At the most interesting part a maid from the Parsonage came to say they
+were wanted, and with real reluctance they rose to go.
+
+Nevertheless, as they walked across the garden their faces grew serious.
+
+"He talks wonderfully well," said Miss Mary at last, anxious to know
+what was in her sister's mind.
+
+"Yes; wonderfully.  He is no doubt an extremely cultured young man.  And
+yet--" she paused.
+
+"And yet?" asked Miss Mary.
+
+"I cannot help it," answered Miss Jane gravely, "but there is something
+in his face that makes me distrust him.  I--I think I wish he had never
+come back to Omeath."
+
+"I wish so, too, sister," said Miss Mary, with like gravity.  "I wish it
+very much;" then they passed into the house.
+
+Meanwhile Eileen sat on, and Lawrence leaned against the boat and looked
+into her beautiful eyes.  He had a way of doing this that was vaguely a
+caress in itself, and that made poor Eileen's heart flutter almost
+fearfully, at the mere thought of all it, perhaps, involved.  When he
+looked at her like that, it made no difference that he might be seated
+some little distance away, and their conversation of the most
+matter-of-fact order; the whole atmosphere was electric to her young
+ingenuousness.  Lawrence might tell himself he meant no harm; and
+console himself at occasional uneasy moments with the reflection that he
+had uttered no word of love, nor drawn any nearer to her than was
+entirely circumspect; yet he, of all others, could not fail to know just
+what power of magnetism he was able to throw into a glance, and what
+inflection of unnamed tenderness could delicately colour his voice,
+though he spoke of only the most commonplace things.  Had he not
+practiced the fine art half over the world; and quietly walked in to
+conquest, over the heads of far better looking and more attractive men.
+Yet he remained unattached: a circumstance sufficiently dangerous in
+itself.  Never in all these years had he gone one inch too far; never
+become more than lightly entangled; yet always a conqueror.  The
+personality that imbued him to his finger-tips, coupled with a certain
+indifference, against which women who loved him flung themselves in
+vain, yet could not break away, had undoubtedly worked far more harm and
+misery than the honest, gay flirtations of many a more censured man.
+Yet he had good points and could be lovable.  Was it, perhaps, the age
+he lived in? the _blase_, free-thinking, free-living set he had become
+identified with, tipping the delicately adjusted balance to the wrong
+side.  However, that might be, the hour had gone by when anyone could
+save Eileen; it must now be either radiant joy or heart-broken misery.
+And meanwhile, into her beautiful eyes, noting also the delicately
+moulded form and exquisite skin, Lawrence looked that vague caress, with
+a willfully blind indifference to the future.  He only knew that she was
+entrancingly fair to gaze upon; and he had not by any means suffered
+from the boredom he had anticipated, before yielding to his mother's
+persuasions.
+
+He chatted on a little while casually now, and then suddenly brought the
+colour flaming to her cheeks by saying, with a charming air of
+persuasion:
+
+"If I am not too premature, Eileen, will you promise me the first dance,
+and the supper-dance on Thursday?  I feel it's rather cheek asking you
+so soon; but I shall get so bored doing the host all the evening; I
+wanted to make quite sure of the two dances that matter the most."
+
+Under the lowered lids her eyes shone.  She had so hoped he would ask
+her for the supper-dance; the event of the evening at their merry
+dances, and yet had hardly dared to hope.  Still, with an exquisite
+flush, she bantered him a little.  "But you may change your mind by
+Thursday!  It seems a long way off yet, and it would be so awkward for
+you if you did."
+
+He laughed lightly.  "I'll promise to tell you if I do, I'll go down on
+my knees and implore your pity and clemency, and your permission to ask
+someone else."
+
+She laughed with him, and then he added, "Mind, I don't say I shall be
+content with those two only, but I daren't claim another now.  Perhaps,
+if my duties as host allow me another opportunity, you will again be
+kind?"
+
+She said nothing, but glanced away from him, feeling deliriously happy;
+and at the same moment Paddy emerged from the garden, with Jack and Ted
+Masterman, one on either side of her.
+
+Lawrence got up at once.  "Here comes your sister," he remarked, "with
+her usual train of admirers.  If you will not mind making excuses for
+me, I will say good-by, as I have to ride on to Carlingford;" and he
+hurried away.
+
+"Where's his august majesty off to, in such a hurry?" asked Paddy, as
+she came up.  "I was just going to ask him to reserve the supper-dance
+for me, as I always like a supper-partner who thinks it is too much
+trouble to talk, and so leaves more time for eating."
+
+"He had to ride on to Carlingford," said Eileen, rising, "so he asked me
+to excuse him to you.  How do you do, Mr Masterman?  I am glad to hear
+you are going to remain for the ball after all."
+
+"Thank you," Ted answered heartily.  "I wouldn't have missed it for
+anything, if I could possibly help it."
+
+"Mr Masterman has just saved my life, or at any rate my beauty,"
+remarked Paddy.  "What do you think I ought to do?"
+
+"How?" questioned Eileen.
+
+"Well, you see, I caught my foot on the top of the wall, when I somewhat
+hastily left the Parsonage just now, and he happened to be on the other
+side, in just the right spot to catch me."
+
+"I expect the poor chap was nearly crushed to death," remarked Jack.
+"He'll go home with a nice opinion of wild Irish girls."
+
+"I shall, indeed," was the fervent rejoinder, looking hard at Paddy; but
+as usual she was already attending to something quite different, and the
+remark, with its double meaning was entirely lost upon her.
+
+Later on, they all four strolled down to the water after dinner, and
+Jack managed to detain Eileen a little behind the others.
+
+He was a trifle awkward and shy as if he had something on his mind, and
+at last, without much preliminary, he blurted out, "You'll give me the
+supper-dance, won't you, Eileen?  I wanted to ask you before, but I
+thought you'd think I was so silly to be asking so soon."
+
+"Oh!  I'm sorry, Jack," with genuine regret for his sake; "I've promised
+it."
+
+"You've promised it!" he echoed in astonishment.
+
+"Yes, this afternoon."
+
+"To whom?" looking hard into her face.
+
+"To Lawrence Blake," and she did not meet his eyes.
+
+Jack stood still suddenly, without quite knowing it, and stared across
+to the mountains.  It seemed to him all in a moment as if some grim
+phantom had suddenly risen, and menaced him for the first time in his
+life, with a vision of striving and failure.
+
+He ground his teeth together angrily.
+
+"Curse Lawrence Blake," he muttered, and kicking some pebbles angrily
+into the lake, strode forward.
+
+CHAPTER TEN.
+
+A LETTER FROM CALCUTTA.
+
+Paddy sat on the morning-room table swinging her feet, and Jack leaned
+against the mantelpiece with his hands in his pockets, biting at the end
+of an empty pipe fitfully, as was his wont when all did not fall out as
+he wished.
+
+  "There was a little girl
+  And she had a little curl
+  Right in the middle of her forehead,"
+
+sang Paddy.
+
+  "And when she was good
+  She was very, very good;
+  And when she was naughty, she was 'orrid."
+
+"Are you going to save me the supper-dance, Paddy!" he asked, without
+moving.
+
+Paddy put her head on one side like a little bird, and eyed him
+quizzically a moment in silence.
+
+"How many people have you already asked!" she said suddenly.
+
+He coloured a little under his sunburn.
+
+"Why should you suppose I have asked anyone!"
+
+"I only wanted to know if you had.  You have got a very tell-tale face,
+and now I can see for myself.  Was it Eileen!"
+
+"Are you going through this cross-examination with all your partners?"
+with a touch of sarcasm.
+
+"It wouldn't be necessary.  You are the only one likely to use me as a
+makeshift."
+
+"You are in a beastly temper this morning."
+
+"Oh no, I'm not," good-naturedly.  "I only had reasons of my own for
+wanting to know.  I suppose Eileen was already promised to Lawrence
+Blake!"
+
+"It was like his impudence," savagely.
+
+"I don't see that.  `First come, first served,' is a perfectly fair
+rule.  You should have been sharper and got there before him.  You see
+you're too late in this quarter also."
+
+"What!  Have you promised too?"
+
+"Yes; yesterday."
+
+Jack bit his lip and felt furious with himself and all the world.
+
+"What in the name of fortune am I to do?" he asked.  "With neither you
+nor Eileen for the supper-dance, I shan't know myself."
+
+"You must ask Kathleen Blake, of course.  It is what you ought to have
+done all along," and then suddenly Paddy swung herself half across the
+room and stepped out of the French window into the garden, and vanished
+in the direction of the shore.  It was unpleasantly present in her mind
+that Jack had not been sufficiently interested to ask to whom she had
+promised the dance; and it left her in that mood when the only relief is
+occupation.  So she untied the boat, stepped in, and proceeded to take a
+steady row.  If Jack continued blind, she wondered vaguely, what would
+become of them all?
+
+"Heigho!" she murmured, resting on her oars.  "It seems to me we're all
+changing.  Jack's getting serious, and Eileen is getting serious, and if
+I don't mind I shall get serious too.  What a pity we can't stay
+children another ten years."  She looked a little dreamily to the
+horizon.  "I wonder if something's going to happen," she mused.  "I've
+an odd feeling somewhere, either in my head, or in my boots--I don't
+quite know which--that there's something in the air; an `Ides of
+March'--sort of feeling that makes me inclined to be quite tragic and
+Julius Caesarish.  Well! well!"--gripping her oars again--"if it comes,
+it comes, Paddy Adair, and you'll just have to make the best of it.
+Meanwhile you had better make hay while the sun shines, and go out with
+the boys shooting as you promised," and she turned homeward again.
+
+Eileen, from far up in the mountain, watched her a little wonderingly,
+recognising the boat and Paddy's vigorous strokes, even from that
+distance.  But she was too engrossed with her own thoughts to wonder
+long, and presently gained her own favourite nook, in which the October
+sun was shining warmly.  Here, sitting down in her favourite attitude,
+she leant her chin in her hands and gazed at the turquoise sea on the
+horizon.  But the old soft dreaminess was changed to-day for that
+wistful, troubled look that had grown of late, and in the depths of the
+deep blue eyes there was a new sadness.
+
+"I cannot help it," she said at last.  "Whether he is a good man or not;
+whether it is right or wrong, I love him, I love him."
+
+Then, raising her eyes to the deep vault of the blue above, she breathed
+softly, "Oh God! help me to help him; teach me, teach me, that if the
+time comes that he should want me, I may be ready and strong to lead him
+back to love, and faith, and happiness.  For the rest, if there must be
+suffering, I will try to be brave and content."
+
+Then she got up and started down the mountain, and when she was about
+half-way home she turned a boulder and came suddenly upon Lawrence Blake
+with his gun and his dogs.
+
+Instantly his thin face lit up with a smile.
+
+"I saw your sister with Masterman and O'Hara about fifteen minutes ago,"
+he said, "and I wondered where you were.  Your sister shot a rabbit
+running in fine style."
+
+"She is a splendid shot," replied Eileen warmly.  "She killed her first
+snipe this summer."
+
+"Did she, indeed!  That's excellent for a girl.  But then she ought to
+have been a boy, really, oughtn't she?  One can't help feeling there's
+good material wasted."
+
+"Why wasted?" she asked.
+
+"Well, to be rather rudely candid, I am not an admirer of your sex at
+all."
+
+"Isn't it rather poor to judge the many by a few who may have
+disappointed you?"
+
+"It would be more correct to say the `few' by the many who have
+disgusted me."
+
+"I am sorry," she said simply: "I wish it had not been so."
+
+"If you knew the world as I do, you would see that it could hardly be
+otherwise."
+
+"Still, I am sorry," she reiterated; "dreadfully sorry."
+
+He watched her a moment covertly.
+
+She was looking her best, with the freshness of the mountain air glowing
+in her eyes and cheeks.  He was thinking she looked as well in her
+tam-o'-shanter, short skirt, and blouse, with linen collar and cuffs, as
+anything he had ever seen her in.  Compared with some of the resplendent
+beauties he had admired, she was as the cosy fireside is to the marble
+palace, or the fragrant violet is to the dazzling poppies.  And then for
+a moment on the mountain side, with the fresh blowing winds, and the
+fragrance, and the loveliness of the lake and mountains, an unusually
+soft mood seemed to take possession of him, and something apart from her
+beauty to stir his pulses and rest his senses.  As they moved on, he
+dropped the bitter, sneering tone so habitual to him, and chatted to her
+frankly and charmingly with unmistakably an assumption of some special
+link between them.
+
+Later on, Eileen went in home with shining eyes and light footsteps,
+feeling as if already her prayer had been answered; and Lawrence's
+mother glanced at him across the luncheon table, wondering to what good
+angel they were indebted for his amiability, instead of his more usual
+taciturn moodiness.
+
+In the afternoon he drove her out himself to pay a call some miles
+distant, chatting pleasantly all the way; and at dinner, he condescended
+to discuss various matters connected with the dance, instead of
+preserving his customary silence.
+
+Then he went into his den for a smoke, and so preoccupied was he for a
+few moments that he did not notice a large, flat piece of pasteboard
+lying on the table, which had evidently arrived by the evening post.
+Instead, he glanced with a casual air of appreciation round his beloved
+bachelor domain, wondering, half-unconsciously, if perhaps the time were
+coming for him to settle down and give up his wanderings.
+
+His eye roved dreamily over his fine collection of foreign swords,
+picked up in all quarters of the globe, and many other strange weapons
+of warfare, arranged fantastically upon the walls--his sporting prints,
+worth large sums of money as originals--his guns and riding stocks--his
+trophies of big game shooting.
+
+Lastly, his books, of which he had also a fine collection, though it
+could not altogether be said to be a credit to his taste; and his prints
+and photographs strewn in all directions.
+
+"I wonder what Eileen would think of them?" was the involuntary thought
+in his mind, and his thin lips parted in a slight smile.
+
+Then he caught sight of the carefully tied pasteboard, and stepping
+forward picked it up with a curious expression.
+
+"By Jove!--Queenie," he muttered, seeing the writing, and proceeded to
+cut the string.
+
+Then he drew from its wrappers the full-length portrait of a beautiful
+girl in fancy dress.
+
+For a long time he stood perfectly still looking at it, then he held it
+at arm's length, trying it in different lights, and surveying it with
+keenly criticising eyes.
+
+"Superb," was his final verdict, muttered under his breath; then he
+leaned it up against another photograph in the place of honour on his
+writing desk, and turned his attention to a little scented note that had
+accompanied it.  A printed slip of newspaper was enclosed in the letter,
+but first he read, in a bold, girlish handwriting:
+
+  "Dear Old Lawrie,--
+
+  "Read the enclosed slip and bow down--even your cynical old head owes
+  homage to such a paragon, and foreseeing my victory, in gracious
+  acceptance of the same homage, I send you the latest portrait of this
+  Queen of Beauty.
+
+  "When shall we prepare your den for you, and duly banish your
+  favourite enemies?  You said you would come again in the autumn--and
+  consequently Calcutta waits.
+
+  "Earl Selloyd haunts our door-step, and mamma has a fancy for a peer
+  as son-in-law.  _Comprenez_?
+
+  "Queenie."
+
+On the slip of newspaper he read:
+
+"At the fancy dress ball last night, given in honour of Lord Kitchener,
+one of the most striking among the younger women was the beautiful Miss
+Gwendoline Grant-Carew, only daughter of the Hon. and Mrs Jack
+Grant-Carew.  She is undoubtedly one of the reigning queens of English
+beauty, and as charming and vivacious as she is fair to look upon."
+
+Holding the letter in his hand, Lawrence again gazed critically at the
+portrait on his desk, and the suggestion of a pleased expression dawned
+on his face.
+
+"So Selloyd's trying to get in the running there, is he?" he mused.
+"Beastly cad!  I owe him one or two since our college days.  It will be
+almost as good sport as tiger shooting to spoil his game for him.  I
+think I'll start for India next month."
+
+Then he put the little note carefully into his pocket-book, and,
+lighting a cigar, sank into a deep arm-chair and stared into the fire,
+dreaming of Gwendoline Grant-Carew.
+
+CHAPTER ELEVEN.
+
+THE SCRIMMAGE PARTY.
+
+Yet the very next morning he was again at Eileen's side, again looking
+that unspoken homage into her eyes.
+
+It was the occasion of what was generally known as a Scrimmage Party at
+The Ghan House, to which he has been inveigled partly on false
+pretences.
+
+"Are you coming to my birthday party?"  Paddy had shouted to him as he
+was riding past in the morning, from the top of a hen-house where she
+was busily endeavouring to mend leakages in the roof.
+
+He reined in his horse, and came as near as he could get.
+
+"What in the name of fortune are you doing up there?"
+
+"I'm fixing on a few odd slates to keep out the rain.  Don't you admire
+my handiwork?"
+
+"Why don't you let your man do it?  Lord!" with amusement, "I never saw
+such a position."
+
+Paddy glanced at her somewhat generous display of ankle, and her feet
+trying to hang on to the roof.
+
+"To tell you the honest truth, Jack was supposed to be going to do it,
+while I handed up the slates, but we quarrelled."
+
+"You seem to enjoy quarrelling with your friends beyond anything.  I
+wonder you have any left."
+
+Now that he had come near, he was in no violent hurry to go on, for
+Paddy, perched on her hen-house roof, had a roguish, dare-devil look
+that was distinctly alluring.
+
+"Oh! they come round again," airily.  "It would often be more fun if
+they didn't.  That's why I like quarrelling with you.  Your
+thunder-clouds last longer."
+
+"Then in future I shall suppress them altogether."
+
+"Not you.  You wouldn't know yourself amiable too long."
+
+"Am I so very bad-tempered?"
+
+Paddy glanced up from her work.
+
+"You're the most detestable person I know, as a rule," she informed him.
+
+Lawrence could not help laughing, though she was evidently quite
+serious.
+
+"I suppose the few intervals when I bask in the sunlight of your favour,
+are when I buy pigs to oblige you, and that kind of thing!  I shouldn't
+have taken you for a time-server, Paddy--only liking people for what you
+can get out of them."
+
+"Daddy was ill over the pigs," she remarked, ignoring his thrust.  "I
+told him while we were at tea, and he choked, and got dreadfully ill,
+because every time he was just calming down, he remembered about Dan'el
+on the floor, or about you having to buy my fifteen.  I daren't even
+mention such a thing as a pig in his hearing now.  He isn't strong
+enough for it.  You see he hadn't quite got over my charging into you
+when I was after that rat, and then making you carry the little beast of
+a ferret and join in," and her eyes shone bewitchingly.
+
+"If you think I'm detestable, what do you suppose I think of you?" he
+asked.
+
+"Oh, no one thinks at all when it's me," with a funny little pursing up
+of her lips, and a sweeping disregard of grammar.  "You see, I can't be
+judged after any ordinary standard, as I'm not ordinary.  I'm not a
+girl, and I'm not a boy--I'm Paddy--`Paddy-the-next-best-thing.'"
+
+He laughed again.  "Oh no! you're not ordinary," he agreed, "and I'm
+rather sorry there are not some more Paddys--I like the breed."
+
+"Jack doesn't," calmly going on with her tinkering.  "He started helping
+me to do this job, and then he got wild, and when I suggested he took
+the slates off the good part to mend the bad, he went off in a huff.  He
+implied that he could do with me when I was funny, but not when I was
+silly," and she chuckled to herself with a remembering relish.
+
+"He has very bad taste.  He should like you in any mood."
+
+"His taste is apparently much the same as yours."  Paddy looked up with
+a queer expression in her eyes, before which he glanced away.  He knew
+she was alluding to Eileen.  "Unfortunately for him," she finished
+calmly.
+
+Lawrence glanced at her again, and when he did so he blew that she had
+spoken with intent.  She had given him either a hint or a warning; he
+could not quite say which; but he understood at once, that in her eyes
+he was already her sister's recognised suitor.  He touched up his horse
+to ride on.  "Well, good-by," lightly.  "May I bring you a birthday
+present this evening?"
+
+"No," she laughed back, "bring a few thunder-clouds to entertain me."
+
+It was not until the evening began, that he discovered what kind of a
+party he had accepted an invitation for.
+
+Paddy enlightened him.
+
+"You've got to begin by sitting on the floor, and playing, `Brother, I'm
+bobbed!'" she announced.  "You'll find it rather hot work, but you can
+cool down afterward, while someone takes your place."
+
+"I've a great admiration for you, Paddy," he answered calmly.  "But not
+for all the Paddys in the world will I sit on the floor and play,
+`Brother, I'm bobbed!'"
+
+"Tut tut!" mimicked, Paddy, screwing up an imaginary eyeglass.  "Your--
+your--shoe a little too tight--did you say!--or was it your--ahem--
+divided skirt...?"
+
+"I said I should not play `Brother, I'm bobbed,'" repeated Lawrence,
+laughing; "but if a score has to be kept of the bobbing--whatever
+process that may be--I am at your service."
+
+"You can go and sit with Daddy, and the old people," scathingly.  "You
+might have guessed my birthday party wasn't very likely to be reclining
+in arm-chairs, and conversing politely."
+
+"May I, as a special favour, be allowed first to mention a package in
+the hall, intended for your Serene Highness--?"
+
+"A package!--in the hall!--Oh! go and sit where you like, and do what
+you like," and she flew off to look for it, returning triumphantly with
+the finest production in confectionery that Newry could boast.
+
+After that Lawrence was left in peace, to sit by the delighted old
+soldier, who laughed till he was again ill, at the wild scenes which
+ensued; until the climax of Paddy on the floor, with a small table of
+bric-a-brac, and the coal box on top of her, with the coals flying in
+all directions, proved too much for him.  When she at last scrambled to
+her feet, with a face Jack and Doreen Blake had surreptitiously smudged
+with coal dust, he had to be led away to his own den for a smoke,
+whither Lawrence accompanied him.  "These Scrimmage Parties are too much
+for me now-a-days," said the fine old warrior, sinking back into his big
+chair.  "Lord! what a girl she is!--what a girl she is!" and there was a
+ring of delight and pride in his voice, which his gentle, beautiful
+daughter never inspired.
+
+"She informed me this morning she was not a girl," remarked Lawrence.
+"She said she was neither a girl, nor a boy, she was Paddy!"
+
+The father chuckled in delight.  "It's about true, for there's not her
+like anywhere.  Begorra, lad!--if she'd been a boy--there'd not have
+been a soldier in the British army to touch her.  But she'll go far
+yet," nodding his head sagely.  "I'll give any beautiful woman points in
+another two or three years, and back Paddy against her.  While the other
+woman's doing her hair, and arranging her dress, and thinking what to
+say, Paddy'll be getting there.  She won't need to stop and think.
+She'll be just herself, and if I'm not much mistaken, the men'll go down
+before her like ninepins.  O Lord!--and she'll snap her fingers in their
+faces, and go rampaging on, like a real, thoroughbred Irish Fusilier.
+
+"But I shall not be there to see," dropping his voice suddenly to a note
+of sadness.  "Take my advice, Lawrence, and marry young.  I married too
+late, and when everything is just at its best, I shall get my summons to
+go."  He shook his head mournfully, and sank for a moment into a
+reverie, seeing his heart's darling, his boy that was a girl, queening
+it over an admiring throng, and he no longer at hand to rejoice.
+Lawrence commenced to chat with him of his travelling adventures, in his
+most engaging manner, to cheer him up; smiling inwardly a little at his
+estimate of the tom-boy, whom he could hardly conceive as yet,
+compelling anything but the indulgent fondness for an amusing child.
+
+A little later she broke in upon them herself, to say they were all
+going for a row on the Loch by starlight, to finish up with an impromptu
+open-air concert, with Ted Masterman's banjo, and Kathleen's guitar.
+They rose to follow her, and soon after the whole night seemed to ring
+with merry choruses from the two boats; a rowdy one containing Jack and
+Paddy, and a few other kindred spirits; and a quiet one with Lawrence
+and Eileen, little Miss Mary, and one or two other less boisterous
+members of the party.
+
+Eileen was very quiet.  Owing to the number in the boat, she and
+Lawrence, he rowing and she in the bow, were nearer than they had ever
+been before, and only the alluring darkness around them.  The rowers
+shipped their oars for a little to listen to the others, and Lawrence
+turned round to the silent figure, half-sitting, half-reclining, beside
+him.
+
+It was an entrancing night, warm and luscious and still, but for the
+lapping of the water against the boat, and the merry sounds from the
+other party.  Overhead gleamed and glittered a million stars.  All
+round, mysteriously grand, mysteriously lovely, towered the Mourne
+Mountains.  Eileen felt herself breathing fitfully, under the spell of
+some ravishing, dream-like ecstasy.  He was so close to her that his
+coat brushed against her arm, and the touch thrilled through all her
+being.  Yet she never moved nor spoke, looking out into the fathomless,
+mystical depths of the night, one little hand resting lightly on the
+edge of the boat, unconsciously near to her companion.
+
+And something in the enervating atmosphere, and the dream-like charm,
+again had that dangerously soothing effect upon Lawrence.  Look where he
+would, think as he would, he could not turn his consciousness from the
+sense of that little soft hand so temptingly close to him in the
+darkness.  What would she do if he followed his impulse, and clasped his
+own over it.
+
+He tried to think of other things and forget it.  If it had been any
+other girl--but not Eileen--no, he dare not trifle with Eileen.  Yet it
+was such a little thing, and he wanted desperately at the moment to feel
+the touch of the little warm fingers in his.  One more effort to
+forget--one more failure--and in the shadows his thin, artistic fingers
+closed over those others.
+
+Eileen did not move nor speak.  For the moment she was too much taken
+aback, and then she was only aware of a swiftly beating heart, and a
+heavenly sense of delight.  But in a few moments, out of the shadows,
+shot the other boat straight toward them, with Paddy leaning over the
+side.  She reached out her hand, and grasping at the bow that held
+Lawrence and Eileen.  Her grasp closed over a dim white object, two
+hands--a man and a woman's--clasped together.
+
+"Ah!" said Paddy to the darkness, with rather startling suddenness, and
+then subsided into silence.
+
+CHAPTER TWELVE.
+
+THE BALL.
+
+Paddy was dressed first, because Eileen did her hair for her, and when
+she was ready she surveyed herself with critical eyes in the long pier
+glass.
+
+"I rather think Paddy will surprise them to-night," she remarked.
+"They'll be coming round and asking her where her snub nose and sallow
+skin are.  I shall say, `They are still there, good people, but don't
+you observe that her hair has entirely effaced everything but itself?'"
+
+In truth she was right, for it would be hard to find lovelier hair than
+Paddy's, and under Eileen's skillful handling it had, indeed,
+overshadowed everything else.
+
+It was of a rich auburn tint, as fine as silk, and had a way of waving
+and curling in thick masses, with a beautiful natural wave, when given
+sufficient freedom.  Paddy, in her perpetual haste, usually spoilt it by
+twisting it too tightly, but to-night Eileen had given the rich coils
+full play, and they curled themselves lovingly round Paddy's pretty
+forehead and slender neck in a way that somehow concealed her failings
+by drawing all attention to themselves.  And then, too, she had the fine
+eyes of her country, and to-night they sparkled and danced in a way that
+was wholly bewitching.  "Daddy," she called through into her father's
+room, "you just won't know me I look so beautiful.  You never thought I
+could look even pretty, did you?--but just wait till you see!"
+
+Then she danced into his dressing-room, and swept him a low courtesy.
+
+"Begorra!" exclaimed the old General delightedly, "you'll take 'em all
+by storm yet.  Get out your scouts, young men, and lay your plan of
+action, for there's a prize to be captured and carried off to-night, and
+no mistake."
+
+"No, there isn't, then, daddy, for I don't mean to be captured nor
+carried off, nor anything else, as long as I can just stay here at The
+Ghan House with you and the motherkins," and she threw her arms round
+the old soldier's neck and hugged him until he cried out that he would
+be suffocated.
+
+Then she smilingly surveyed her crumpled lace.
+
+"I guess we'll get into trouble if we don't mind!" she remarked.  "See
+what you've done to my lace!"
+
+"What _I've_ done, indeed!  I should like to know who had a finger in
+that pie beside yourself."
+
+Paddy smoothed her lace and went downstairs a little thoughtfully, to
+see if Jack had come across yet from the rectory.
+
+She found him standing in the hall, and when he saw her he exclaimed,
+"Is that you, Paddy?--is that really you?"
+
+"Yes," with a little nod, "it's really me.  You've always been at great
+pains to impress upon me that I'm hopelessly plain, Jack.  Perhaps, now,
+you'll have the politeness to own you were wrong," and she looked up at
+him with her brilliant smile.
+
+"I don't somehow feel sure that it's you yet, though," he answered.
+"Where did you get all that hair from?"
+
+"It's been there all along, but I couldn't be bothered to do it
+properly, so to-night Eileen did it."
+
+"Isn't she dressed yet?"
+
+"No; so I took the opportunity of coming down to be admired before I am
+outshone."  She tripped across the hall and stood where the full light
+of the lamps shone upon her, throwing back her small head triumphantly,
+and unconsciously striking an attitude full of grace and piquancy.
+
+There was a dark wainscoting round the hall, and Jack saw with no small
+surprise that, thrown into relief by the dark background, her dainty
+dress becoming her perfectly, she formed a really lovely picture.  His
+admiration showed in his eyes, and suddenly a beautiful flush spread
+over her somewhat colourless cheeks.
+
+"That's the first time you've ever seen anything in me but a
+harum-scarum tom-boy, isn't it, Jack?" she said, and there was an
+unaccountable note of wistfulness in her tone.  "Look again--Eileen will
+be here directly, and then you will forget."
+
+A light footstep sounded at the top of the stairs, and instantly she
+dashed her hand across her eyes as if to drive away some unwelcome
+recollection, and laughing gayly, called:
+
+"Come along, Eileen; I've been playing your _role_ of family beauty for
+nearly ten minutes, just to see how it felt, but `harum-scarum Paddy'
+suits me best, and you've come just at the right time to save me from a
+total collapse."
+
+Jack took a step forward to the staircase, with all his soul in his
+eyes, as Eileen came slowly down, saying:
+
+"Don't be silly, Paddy.  I'm sure the first place is yours to-night."
+
+Jack said nothing, but he thought he had never in all his life seen
+anything so beautiful as Eileen Adair.  She wore white only, and the
+fluffy, lacy style that was so becoming to Paddy was replaced in her
+dress by an almost severe simplicity, that suited perfectly her
+Madonna-like sweetness, and deep, calm, wonderful eyes.
+
+"Well, we won't let Jack be a second Paris, anyhow," laughed Paddy,
+"because he would not give a perfectly unbiased judgment, being already
+prejudiced.  But where are the aunties?" turning to the drawing-room,
+from which came a sound of voices; "are they here yet?"
+
+"Rather!" exclaimed Jack impressively.  "You just see!  I tell you, you
+and Eileen are not in it," and they all crossed the hall together.
+
+Paddy threw open the drawing-room door with a flourish, and, as they
+entered, exclaimed, "Behold!--not the meeting of the two great monarchs
+of old, but the meeting of the reigning beauties of Omeath to-day."
+
+Then she darted forward toward the two little ladies, crying, "Oh, you
+look just lovely!--lovely!  I really must hug you."
+
+"Oh! my dear! my dear!" they both gasped, and Miss Jane got quickly
+behind her chair, while Miss Mary fluttered across the room and
+ensconced herself behind the sofa.
+
+"What's the matter!" cried Paddy.  "I won't touch you--I promise I
+won't.  Do come out and let us have a full view."
+
+After thoroughly reassuring themselves that she really meant it, Miss
+Jane stepped forward, and Miss Mary timidly followed suit, and then
+began a general criticising and admiring all round, in which Jack joined
+in his usual lively fashion.
+
+"Aunties, don't you think Cinderella's Fairy Godmother must have been
+here with her magic wand!" he exclaimed, "and turned Paddy into as much
+of a beauty as she could possibly get her?  I shall take care not to be
+dancing with her at twelve o'clock, because I feel quite certain on the
+first stroke of the hour she will become herself again, and her hair
+will be coming down, her dress torn, and she will look just like she
+does in ordinary life."
+
+"Then we shall only be better paired than we were before," retorted
+Paddy, "because you do not look in the least like a prince.  Aunt Mary,
+you are lovely!" running on with eager warmth.  "Oh!  I should like to
+know what you looked like at my age."
+
+"She was very beautiful, my dear," said Aunt Jane proudly.  "I always
+dressed her for balls myself."
+
+"Oh; no, not quite that, sister," murmured Miss Mary, in anxious
+self-deprecation; "just pretty, perhaps, sister, but that was all."
+
+"No; beautiful," asserted Miss Jane again, in a voice that allowed no
+contradiction.
+
+"And you the same, Aunt Jane, I expect!" said Eileen, smiling.
+
+"No, I was more like Paddy here.  I knew that my chief charm lay in my
+expression and spirits, and so I did not worry any more than she about
+my appearance and clothes."
+
+"Do I understand you to say you didn't bother to wear clothes, Aunt
+Jane?" asked Jack in solemn surprise, at which the two little ladies
+looked horrified and Paddy and Eileen laughed, and just then the
+General, who had at last managed to get into his extra-special best
+dress suit, bustled into the room.
+
+"Jack, my boy," he said, taking the younger man's arm, "take my advice
+and don't let yourself get stout.  If you only knew what I have gone
+through, trying to get into these clothes!--I wonder I didn't have a fit
+of apoplexy!  There!  I do indeed!  And five years ago they fitted me
+perfectly.  Bedad!  I'm not sure now the coat won't split all up the
+back before the evening is half over, and I'm afraid to see if I can sit
+down for fear it might result in my not being able to go to the ball at
+all."
+
+"We wouldn't go without you, daddy, anyhow," exclaimed Paddy.  "Don't
+the aunties look lovely?  Aren't you just dreadfully in love with both
+of them?  I'm sure mother will be jealous before the evening is over."
+
+"Certainly I am; I always have been!  Didn't you know that, you minx!
+If they hadn't both been so obdurate long ago all sorts of things might
+have happened, eh, Jane?" and the old man laughed heartily.  "Do you
+remember boxing my ears under the mulberry tree one Sunday afternoon?
+Faith! you were a vixen," and he laughed so heartily that Mrs Adair
+hurried forward with anxious reminders concerning his clothes.
+
+"They weren't made to laugh in, daddy," cried Paddy delightedly, "and I
+feel a little like that about mine, so we'd better keep together, and
+remind each other occasionally, hadn't we?"
+
+Carriage wheels were heard then, and the roomy omnibus engaged to carry
+them all to the Lodge drove up to the door.
+
+The two little ladies got in first, holding their new silk dresses very
+high above their ankles, and carefully folding shawls all round them
+before they ventured to sit down, in case there was a speck of dirt on
+the seats.  Then Mrs Adair and Eileen, whose eyes were shining already
+with a new happiness; and lastly Paddy and Jack hoisted the General up
+between them, so that there was the least possible strain upon his
+clothes.
+
+Then they set off amid the usual sparring between Jack and Paddy, a
+gentle sort of purring from the two little ladies, and sundry loud
+guffaws from the General.  Only Eileen and her mother were silent--the
+one lost in a dear dreamland of delicious anticipation, and the other
+anxiously, watching with vague misgivings in her heart.
+
+There were no misgivings for Eileen that night.  The last week had held
+so many dear moments, her mind was only too ready to be blinded to all
+else and wait dreamily for her joy.
+
+But a mother's eyes see so much, and Mrs Adair knew her world--likewise
+little Miss Mary, who, in the midst of her soft purring, now and then
+threw wistful glances toward Eileen's shining eyes and beautiful face.
+
+Mrs Blake and Lawrence received their guests in the large
+billiard-room, which had been cleared for dancing, and by the time the
+party from The Ghan House arrived quite a large number had already
+collected.  When General Adair led Miss Jane into the room with
+old-fashioned courtly grace, followed closely by Mrs Adair and Miss
+Mary, and the young folks at their heels, there was quite a little stir
+among the chatting groups.  For though they did not entertain in a big
+way themselves, General and Mrs Adair were known and respected
+throughout the county, while the two girls were favourites wherever they
+went; and, as has already been said, the little ladies from the rectory
+were almost an institution.
+
+When Mrs Blake and Lawrence had shaken hands with them, others
+clustered round eagerly, but Lawrence had time to look hard into
+Eileen's eyes, and murmur, "Don't forget the first dance is mine,"
+before she was carried off by other friends.  Paddy and Jack were almost
+immediately seized upon by Kathleen and Doreen, who were in great glee
+over their own coming-out.
+
+"How does it feel?" asked Jack.  "Anything like a snail squeezing out of
+a shell, or like falling out of a tree?"
+
+"Neither," they exclaimed; "more like being crowned queen."
+
+"And expecting everyone to bow down to you," added Doreen gayly.  "I
+hope you are prepared to be finely ordered about?"
+
+"That won't be anything new.  It seems to me I have been at yours and
+Kathleen's beck and call ever since I can remember--to say nothing of
+Paddy and Eileen, who treat me as if I was only created to wait on them.
+I suppose I shall be expected to lead off the ball with one of you!"
+feigning disgust.
+
+"What impudence!" they cried together.  "Here are we impressing upon you
+that in future you are to treat us with great respect, and you start off
+by coolly claiming one of the greatest favours we can confer."
+
+"Not at all," quoth Jack.  "I merely await your orders.  I know that one
+of you will expect me to have the first dance with you, and all I ask
+is, which?"
+
+"Then you are just wrong," said Doreen, tossing her head.  "I wouldn't
+lead the dance off with you--if--if--my kingdom depended upon it."
+
+"Well, I never asked you to," wickedly.  "You shouldn't be in such a
+hurry to decline before you're asked."
+
+"You wretch," with a laugh.  "Well, I'll just take you to pay you out.
+There--write `Jack' on the first line at once," and she handed him her
+programme.
+
+Jack took it readily, for of the two he preferred Doreen, the younger,
+and he calmly proceeded to write his name faintly the whole way down the
+cardboard.
+
+"Goodness!" she cried, when he gave it back to her.  "Look at this,
+Paddy!  Did you ever see such cool impudence?"
+
+"They're nearly all promised to me," said Paddy calmly, "so it's of no
+consequence, and now we can both treat him as we like.  He'll be very
+useful if we get partners we don't like, and, of course, he can't dance
+with anyone else."
+
+"No of course not--what fun," and Doreen and Paddy went of gayly, while
+Jack sought Eileen.
+
+"He's put the supper-dance very black, so he means that," said Doreen.
+"Why isn't he having it with you as usual?"
+
+"I guess he thought he'd like a change," Paddy replied loyally, "and
+quite time," and Doreen was satisfied.
+
+The next moment a voice in Paddy's ear, with a ring in it that she could
+not well mistake, said quietly:
+
+"I've been looking everywhere for you, Miss Adair."
+
+"Then you must be very blind," she answered brightly, "for in my own
+estimation I've been very much _en evidence_ all the time so far.  But
+perhaps you did not recognise me?"
+
+"Perhaps," with a little smile, and Ted Masterman surveyed her in that
+quiet, masterly way of his, that always made Paddy feel rebellious, with
+the most unmistakable admiration written on his face.
+
+"You look like the Great Mogul," she exclaimed, "criticising me in that
+calmly superior way.  It's all my own hair; don't be alarmed."
+
+"It's the most beautiful hair I have ever seen," he said, in a quiet way
+that could not possibly offend her.  "I always thought it was a pity you
+did not treat it better."
+
+"Then you had no business to think about it at all, or to criticise me."
+
+"A cat may look at a queen.  How many dances are you going to give me,
+now I have risked losing my berth to be here!"
+
+"Perhaps two," hiding a twinkle in her eyes.
+
+"More," he answered.
+
+"No," resolutely.
+
+"I say _more_."
+
+"I don't care what you say."
+
+"I am going to have my dances all the same," and he gained possession of
+her programme.
+
+"I've a great mind to cancel the supper-dance, and not have any with
+you," trying to look annoyed.
+
+"Now you look angry," he said; "but don't be cross to-night.  After
+to-morrow I shall not trouble you again for a long time, so you can well
+afford to be magnanimous."
+
+Paddy evidently agreed, for she took back her programme and only feigned
+a slight frown when she saw his name on four different lines.
+
+Without meaning to be unkind, the thought, "perhaps it will vex Jack,"
+entered into her mind and stayed there.
+
+And so the game at cross-purposes went on.
+
+CHAPTER THIRTEEN.
+
+PADDY'S VIEWS ON SENTIMENTALITY.
+
+When the music for the first dance commenced, General Adair led out Mrs
+Blake, and almost simultaneously Kathleen and Doreen with their
+partners, and Lawrence with Eileen followed suit.  Paddy, however,
+waited breathless, to watch her father.
+
+"I'm all on thorns," she explained to her partner.  "I simply can't
+dance for a minute or two.  Daddy's clothes are too tight for him to
+laugh in with any safety, so goodness knows what will happen if he
+dances long!--I must warn him."
+
+She succeeded in getting within earshot, and at a loss for an
+appropriate warning, remarked in an audible whisper, with feigned
+anxiety: "Daddy--remember Lot's wife," which so tickled the old soldier
+that he nearly come to grief through her, instead of being saved from
+it.
+
+"How well she looks to-night!"  Mrs Blake said warmly, following Paddy
+with admiring eyes.  "You must be very proud of your girls, General.
+One is beautiful, and the other full of originality and charm."
+
+"I am, Madam," he said.  "I am, indeed.  There's not an officer in the
+British Army knows less about fear than Paddy--she'd storm any
+stronghold in the face of any guns, and never turn a hair.  If she'd
+been a man, she'd have written her name in English History.  I used to
+fret about it a little, but Lord!  I wouldn't change her now for all the
+fame in Europe.  I'm thinking there's just as much need in the world for
+brave women as brave men, and none too many of them."
+
+"Indeed, you are right, General.  Paddy will find her vocation yet, and
+perhaps write her name in history too."
+
+Meanwhile, Lawrence and Eileen glided round almost in silence.  Both
+were perfect dancers, and content while the music continued to leave all
+conversation alone.  Afterward they rested in a small alcove, and
+Lawrence took the opportunity to feast his eyes on his partner's
+loveliness.
+
+"You are looking splendid, Eileen," he said, with unwonted warmth for
+him, "that dress suits you perfectly.  Did you choose it yourself?"
+
+"Yes," lowering her eyes, that they might not tell too plainly their
+tale of gladness.
+
+He hatched her a moment, thinking of her perfect naturalness, and then
+across his mind floated the picture and remembrance of Gwendoline Carew.
+How different they were, these two girls, who, for the present at any
+rate, held sway in his fickle affections.
+
+Against Eileen's simplicity, he could not help a little inward smile at
+the thought of Gwendoline's past-masterdom in the art of attracting, and
+holding, and queening it generally over the opposite sex.  He thought he
+would like to see them together, and supposing Gwendoline should take it
+into her head to be jealous, he smiled inwardly at the notion of what
+her summing up of her rival might be.
+
+Then Eileen looked up into his face, and somehow again his defences grew
+weak.
+
+"Out of sight, out of mind," had ever been his motto, and while the
+image of Gwendoline faded, a recklessness took possession of him to
+enjoy the evening to the full.  It was so seldom he found anything to
+enjoy now, and he easily persuaded himself Eileen was too sensible to
+jump to rash conclusions.
+
+And for the rest! well! he was going to India directly, and things would
+easily smooth themselves out again.
+
+So he leaned forward and talked to her just in the way she liked best,
+and the way that brought the colour quickest to her cheeks, and the
+changing lights to her eyes that were so good to look upon.
+
+"Now I must go and give myself up to duty," he finished with a sigh,
+when the second dance was about to commence.  "It feels rather like
+journeying through a sandy desert, with an occasional oasis when I dance
+with you."
+
+"Oh, no!" she said quickly.  "There are such a lot fit nice people here,
+you will enjoy it all ever so much."
+
+"Opinions differ," with a slight shrug of his shoulders.  "But I shall
+certainly get half an hour's amusement out of Paddy."
+
+The supper-dance at all private dances in the neighbourhood of Newry was
+looked upon as the dance of the evening, because it was the one in which
+any two young people who had a special preference for each other could
+be quite sure of a _tete-a-tete_.  Things were arranged very leisurely,
+as it was customary for the hand to follow to supper after the guests,
+and meanwhile the young folks amused themselves.
+
+On this particular occasion, however, there chanced to be several young
+folks to whom circumstances had not been kind, and consequently,
+contrary to all precedent, the time hung heavily.
+
+Of these, Jack perhaps was the greatest sufferer.  If he could have been
+with Eileen he would have been in a seventh heaven, but not only was he
+debarred of this, but he saw with raging heart two vanishing forms in
+the direction of one of the conservatories, unmistakably those of Eileen
+and Lawrence Blake.  At supper he had been near them, and in one or two
+brief passages, his honest outspoken antipathy to Lawrence has been
+neatly turned upon himself by the accomplished society man, and there
+had at the same time been a half-tolerant, amused expression in his eyes
+that made Jack feel like a caged wild beast.  This naturally had only
+given his enemy the greater secret satisfaction.
+
+Then if only he had had Paddy, he thought he might have relieved his
+feelings a little; but having Lawrence's own sister for a partner, there
+was nothing for it but to try and hide his chagrin under a show of
+hilarity.  In this he at least entertained such of those who remained
+chatting in groups by the fire.
+
+He little dreamed, however, that poor Paddy was in scarcely better
+plight.  Not that she disliked Ted Masterman in any way, indeed she
+liked him immensely, but when he was lover-like it fidgeted her, feeling
+just that soreness over Eileen, that made any other man's attentions
+unwelcome and irritating.
+
+Nevertheless, she found herself sitting in the little alcove half-way up
+the big staircase with him, where the moonlight came through the
+stained-glass window and made a pattern on the floor, shaded by the
+heavy curtains from the glare of the lights.
+
+Below them in the bright comfortable hall near a large log fire, they
+could see the little groups, that laughed and applauded, while Jack in
+company with a youth as lively and irresponsible as himself, feigned a
+merriment he was far from feeling.  Paddy watched, and in her own quaint
+way, rebelled against a Fate that made puppets of herself and her
+friends, for she understood exactly what was passing in Jack's mind.
+
+Indeed, she was so engrossed that she gave quite a start when her
+companion, after watching her in silence for some minutes, remarked
+quietly:
+
+"I'd give something to know what you are thinking of, Miss Adair."
+
+"Why! the group down there, of course," she answered.  "They look so
+pretty, don't they, in evening dress, with the big old hall for
+background and the firelight on their faces?"
+
+"Yes," quietly, "but personally I can find a still more pleasing picture
+close at hand."
+
+"Oh, the moonlight!" with a gesture of impatience.  "It's making you
+look quite sentimental.  Please don't give way to it, though, because if
+so, I shall be obliged, to give up this comfortable chair and go to the
+hall.  I can't bear sentimental people; they irritate me frightfully."
+
+The man smiled a little in the shadow, and the look of innate strength
+and resoluteness of purpose deepened on his face.  There was that in Ted
+Masterman's eyes to-night, as from the vantage ground of shadow, they
+jested unceasingly on Paddy's face, which suggested a preparation for a
+struggle in which he meant to win.
+
+How long or how short seemed a matter of little importance just then;
+for one instinctively saw in him the steady perseverance of the man who
+knows how to wait.
+
+And it is generally to such the victory is given; for greater than the
+power of riches, or learning, is the power of knowing how to wait.
+
+Ever since Ted Masterman helped a drenched, dripping figure of a girl
+into his little sailing yacht, and met that frank face that ended in
+laughter, in spite of her sorry plight, he had known himself her slave,
+and that henceforth the purpose of his life would be to win her.  If the
+winning was to be hard, and suffering entailed, he was prepared to face
+it, because he knew that Paddy was worth the cost, whatever it proved,
+from the first time that he saw her in her own home.
+
+His keen eyes noted instantly that the charm and brightness, which made
+her so popular abroad, were just as freely lavished upon her own circle,
+and that if she were beloved by her outside friends, she was yet more
+beloved and idolised there.
+
+Then, when he found her perfectly indifferent to his attentions, the
+spirit of conquest was roused within him tenfold, and he loved her yet
+more for her airy independence.
+
+He half guessed her feeling for Jack O'Hara; but Jack's devotion to
+Eileen had recently become so plaint to all except Eileen herself, that
+he did not let it trouble him.  In this he was wrong, for Paddy was,
+before all thing, staunch, and having given her affections, she would
+not easily change.
+
+"I'm not getting sentimental at all," he replied.  "I know better, for I
+don't want to have my head bitten off my last evening."
+
+Paddy smiled, and was mollified.
+
+"It's awfully silly, isn't it?" she said.  "I hate anything sentimental.
+I like people who call a spade a spade."
+
+"And I wonder what you like them to call love?" he suggested.
+
+"Oh, `love,' I suppose, only they needn't look like sick sheep over it,
+and prefix half a dozen idiotic adjectives."
+
+"I thought perhaps the mere word was too sentimental," with a little
+smile, "and you would prefer to invent some term of your own."
+
+"Very likely I shall, when the time comes for it.  At present I have a
+great deal too much on my hands to have time to think of anything of the
+kind."
+
+"In what way?"
+
+"Why! every way of course!  There's Daddy, and mother, and Eileen, and
+the aunties."  She paused a moment, but something in his eyes made her
+run on recklessly.  "Oh! and the Sunday School, and the garden, and the
+hockey club, and the aunties' cats, and Jack--!"
+
+"It's quite a long list," looking amused, "and O'Hara at the far end."
+
+"He's in good form to-night," she said, gazing down at the group in the
+hall.
+
+Ted followed her eyes.
+
+"He seems to have cheered up since supper."
+
+"He can't bear Lawrence Blake, he never could, and they were sitting
+rather near together at supper."
+
+"I fancy there's a little rivalry," he suggested.
+
+"Oh, I don't know!" with an attempt at unconcern.  "He never did like
+him at any time."
+
+"Blake is a very clever man," thoughtfully.
+
+"Yes--but he's awfully conceited.  I'm always trying to take him down a
+little."
+
+There was a short silence, then Ted remarked very quietly:
+
+"This time to-morrow I shall be on my way home, and my holiday will be
+over--the very best holiday I ever had in my life.  I suppose I shall
+not see you again until next summer, when I hope to come back!"
+
+"I guess not."
+
+"I'm sorry Omeath is so far from London--"
+
+Paddy began to fidget, and kept her eyes fixed on the group in the hall.
+
+Ted watched here again with that keen gaze of his; and a great
+tenderness all unknown to himself spread over his strong face.  He
+seemed to see instinctively, that in some way, a hard time lay ahead for
+this eager, impulsive girl; and that with all his love and devotion, he
+would have to stand aside and look on, without being able to help her.
+If so, he knew that whatever it proved for her, it could not be less
+hard for him, and his heart sank a little.  He wanted very much to tell
+her about his love before he went home, but her very attitude told him
+the uselessness of it, and he did not want to vex her their last
+evening.
+
+So instead, he asked with a smile: "Would it be too sentimental to say
+`thank you' for all you've done to make my holiday the best I've ever
+had?"
+
+"Yes, decidedly.  Besides, I haven't done anything at all except torment
+you occasionally.  Let us go down to the hall.  I want to know what
+they're all laughing at," and she got up without another word and led
+the way downstairs.
+
+Jack glanced toward them as they approached, and Paddy saw vaguely an
+expression of pain underlying the gaiety of his manner, that hurt her
+like a blow.  She could not bear to be miserable herself, but she could
+bear it still less if those she loved were miserable.  She looked round
+vaguely for Eileen, feeling an impulse to annihilate Lawrence, and make
+Eileen see how things stood.  But neither were to be seen.  Under the
+large palm by the fountain in the conservatory, Lawrence was again
+feasting his eyes on his partner's loveliness, and skillfully drawing
+that changing colour to her cheeks, and those lights and shadows to her
+beautiful eyes.
+
+CHAPTER FOURTEEN.
+
+THE CONSERVATORY AND THE DEN.
+
+The fountain had a little tinkling, singing sound, and there was a
+delicious odour of flowers, which mingled entrancingly with the shaded
+lights and graceful bending ferns.  Eileen felt it rather than saw it,
+as though all her senses had become one deep appreciation and enjoyment.
+
+Long afterward, when recalling every moment of that quiet half-hour, she
+was conscious of exactly the light, and the scent, and the sound, and
+would shrink away from certain hot-house flowers as if they hurt her.
+
+But for the present there was only a deep content in her heart and a
+vague dream of happiness, shedding a soft light over all her future.  In
+all their intercourse, it seemed to her that Lawrence had never been
+quite so fascinating before, and though now and then he seemed to draw
+himself up sharply and suddenly adopt a very matter-of-fact tone, she
+scarcely heeded it.  In truth, though Lawrence meant to enjoy his
+half-hour to the full, he had no intention of becoming lover-like; and
+when he found her charm growing too much for him, he did indeed pull
+himself up with a jerk and try to resist.  Yet he could not bring
+himself to be sufficiently honest to speak of his approaching departure
+for India.  He felt there was time enough, and if he told her now, he
+might be led into explanations that would be troublesome.
+
+And Lawrence hated anything at all disturbing or troublesome, or in the
+nature of an explanation.
+
+Eileen was not blind to his failings, and many a time his callousness
+had hurt her, but, like so many good women, she had a boundless faith in
+the power of goodness, and believed she could make anything of him once
+he loved her.  In this she was doubtless right, but she was too
+pure-minded and honest herself to perceive double-dealing in others, and
+she did not realise that a man like Lawrence might act one thing and
+feel another.
+
+_If_ he had loved her, she might have made anything of him; yet--but
+what if he did not?  Lawrence admired her beauty and respected her
+goodness, but he did not love her--he only pretended to himself that he
+liked her better than any one else when they happened to be together.
+Possibly, if "love" came at will, he would have chosen then and there to
+love her with his whole heart and make her his wife.  But Love is a
+fugitive, wild thing--bold as a robin, and timid as a lark--and usually
+none can fit any "why" or "wherefore" to its erratic wanderings.  And
+hand in hand with Love is usually Pain--pain against which we cry out
+blindly, and wrestle and struggle to escape--childishly indifferent to
+the teaching of the Ages--that Pain alone is the soil in which grow
+Strength, and Courage, and Joy.
+
+In the worst hour of her suffering afterward, Eileen was yet, in a
+sense, happier and richer than the man who caused the pain.
+
+But now the fountain tinkled and the lights glowed softly, and the scent
+of hot-house flowers filled the air.
+
+"I thought it would be deadly at Omeath," Lawrence was saying.  "If it
+had not been for the mater, I should not have come, and, instead, it has
+been very pleasant.  How often it happens that we start off on some trip
+we expect to enjoy thoroughly, and are disappointed all through; whereas
+we make martyrs of ourselves and undertake something we detest, and it
+turns out a pleasure from beginning to end."
+
+Eileen looked a little thoughtful.  The thought crossed her mind that he
+had not, then, came back for her.
+
+"Yet you seemed happy enough here before?" she remarked at last.
+
+"So I was," he replied at once; "and I had just the same feeling about
+coming in the first place.  But then I did not know about you, Eileen."
+
+"But you did this time," smiling.
+
+"Three years is so long," he answered unblushingly; "and I imagined, of
+course, you would have changed, or got married, or something.  Most
+girls change very much in three years."
+
+"Do they?" quietly.
+
+"Yes; but you and Paddy are evidently different.  I might have known you
+would be."  He turned the subject deftly to a less dangerous theme,
+speaking of mutual friends, until a sudden cutting censure brought a
+remonstrance to her lips.
+
+He looked into her face and changed his tone suddenly.
+
+"All the black sheep are white to you, Eileen.  You are too ideal.  You
+look at everything through the spectacles of idealism, and expect too
+much of life.  You would be wiser to try and harden your heart, and care
+a little less about everything.  You seem to regard most of your
+fellow-creatures as possible angels, and all the time we are most of us
+rogues and scoundrels."
+
+"I don't believe it," firmly.
+
+"That's because you don't want to.  All the same it is true.  Half the
+world knows it, and makes no fuss; and the other half pretends to be
+blind for their own satisfaction."
+
+"You only talk like this to tease me," she said; "but I like your
+honesty.  A man who pretends to nothing and is something is so much
+nicer than the man who is nothing and pretends much."
+
+"I am neither," he answered, "for I combine the two.  I pretend nothing,
+and I don't care."  She smiled a little in spite of herself.  "You do
+pretend something, for you pretend that you do not care."
+
+He looked into her eyes a moment, with a curious expression in his, and
+Eileen glanced away with embarrassment.  He was thinking for the
+hundredth time how sweet she was, and how--if only--?
+
+He knew vaguely that the man who won her would win a treasure; but he
+loved his liberty, and his heart said "not yet," and so he contented
+himself with a look that might mean volumes, or nothing.
+
+And Eileen was satisfied.  He had paid no real attention to anyone but
+her, merely doing his duty as host to the rest of his guests, and,
+undoubtedly, that meant a good deal.
+
+As a matter of fact it was so.  Lawrence was nearer proposing that
+evening than he had ever been in his life before, and he could hardly
+himself have told what deterred him.  Perhaps it was a question of the
+bandsmen finishing their supper five minutes earlier than was expected--
+upon so slight a thread hang the issues of life.  Certainly, leaning
+forward with his arms resting on his knees, and his whole soul drawn
+toward the sweet-faced girl beside him, he felt himself on the brink of
+the plunge that would have changed all her life and his, when, quite
+unexpectedly, the band struck up in the distance.
+
+At the first note, he sat up suddenly, as if he had been awakened, and
+instead of the question trembling on his lips he smiled a little, and
+said: "How cruelly the time has flown!  I had no idea we had been here
+half an hour!" and then they both got up, and he gave her his arm back
+to the ball-room.
+
+Eileen felt a queer little tremor that was almost fear, but she only
+answered in her usual quiet tone, and smiled up at the partner who came
+forward to claim her for the dance.
+
+But the evening was not over yet, and another incident had still to add
+its mark upon the unfolding of the hours.  Lawrence had still to have
+his dance with Paddy.
+
+It came toward the end, when some of the guests, who had a long drive,
+had already departed, and the formality of the commencement of the
+evening had merged into a more free and easy air for all.  Paddy had had
+a set of lancers with Jack, and Doreen and Kathleen and their partners,
+that had bordered upon a romp, and had made her eyes shine, and her
+cheeks glow with radiant enjoyment, for she had the happy knack of
+throwing herself heart and soul into the moment, and in this instance
+the moment had been full of delight.
+
+Lawrence found her trying to get cool again, while carrying on her usual
+flow of chatter, to the amusement of the others; and with a smile, he
+remarked:
+
+"I'm sorry to deprive you all, but this is my dance with Miss Adair."
+
+"Goodness!" exclaimed Paddy in alarm.  "Do I dance with you next?"
+
+"According to my programme you do."
+
+"Oh, that's all right," frankly.  "I was only thinking my hair was
+rather untidy, and my face somewhat highly coloured for such an august
+occasion as a dance with your majesty."
+
+"Your hair never looked better," he replied, "and your colour is most
+becoming."
+
+"Really!" with a gay laugh.  "If you keep this up for five minutes I
+shan't know myself.  You must be careful, for the high honour of dancing
+with you alone is almost sufficient to unhinge my giddy brain."
+
+"You could hardly dance with me and someone else at the same time," with
+corresponding lightness; "but I'm glad that you appreciate the honour so
+thoroughly."
+
+"Appreciate it!  Why, my dear man, I've been dying for this dance all
+the evening."
+
+"May you be forgiven," he retorted as they glided away.  Paddy was quite
+as good a dancer as Eileen when she gave herself up to it, and, with
+such a perfect waltzer as Lawrence, she could not fail to do so, even if
+she could not be prevailed upon to enjoy it in silence.  So, as they
+glided round, she plied him with a string of eager questions relating to
+dancing and gayeties in far-off lands.
+
+"You ought to get your father to take you abroad," he told her
+presently! "you'd enjoy all the novelty so tremendously."
+
+"Should I meet a lot of nice, superior, cultured young men like you?"
+
+"Well, hardly up to my standard," he laughed.
+
+"Then I don't want to go.  When I can talk to you, and dance with you,
+and gaze upon you here, why cross the sea to other climes?"
+
+"I was thinking more of the countries."
+
+"And have you ever seen anything in all the world so beautiful as the
+Mourne Mountains and Carlingford Loch?"
+
+"Yes, many things."
+
+"I don't believe it," stoutly.
+
+"Well, come and see some of my photographs in my den."
+
+"What!  Enter the throne-room!" in mock amaze.
+
+"Yes; why not?"
+
+"Oh no `why not' at all.  I'm simply dying to go.  I have been, ever
+since I can remember.--I'm wild with curiosity to know what kind of
+things an animal of your lofty nature collects in its den," and she
+followed him eagerly down a long passage, and through a little
+conservatory into the large, airy room known as Lawrence's den.
+
+When he had switched on the electric light, her eyes grew wide with
+interest and admiration.
+
+"Well! if this isn't just all right," she exclaimed.  "How daddy would
+love it!"
+
+"It's somewhat warlike," glancing at his swords and weapons, "so you
+ought to feel at home."
+
+"I?--Why?" in surprise.
+
+"Because you are always trying to quarrel with me."
+
+"Nonsense!  I only tell you a few home truths for your good."
+
+"I hope you find your pupil progressing favourably."
+
+"Very middling," with a shake of her head.  "You know perfectly well you
+have been bored to death nearly the whole evening, because there were
+only two or three people you thought worth talking to."
+
+"And if so--it is hardly my fault."
+
+"Why, of course it is!  The people were just as nice as you, really--
+rather nicer in fact--the only difference is a mere question of having
+studied Browning, and Darwin, and a lot of musty old German and French
+writers, whom, I'll be bound to say, you don't half understand."
+
+"Possibly not.  But they have a way of developing the mind."
+
+"Developing the mind!" scornfully.  "What's the matter with my mind?--it
+develops itself.  I don't pore over musty books."
+
+"Perhaps you are naturally more gifted," with light satire.
+
+"Sarcasm is wasted on me," she retorted.  "It flows off like water from
+a duck's back.  Why not tell me straight I'm an ignoramus?  Just as I
+tell you straight that all your learning and experience does not give
+you the right to think yourself so superior to other people, and give
+yourself such airs."
+
+"You are very outspoken," smiling a little in spite of himself.
+
+"Yes; but I can take plain speaking, too, so if you want to have your
+revenge, fire away.  I know that I've got a snub nose and no complexion,
+and am always more or less untidy, because I've been told so often, but
+you can tell me again if you like."
+
+"I'd rather set you an example in good manners."
+
+"That's good," appreciating it at once.
+
+"Besides," he added slyly, "I don't see that it isn't just as bad to be
+proud of a snub nose and untidiness, as of a beautiful nose or book
+learning, and from the way you speak you positively revel in them."
+
+"You have me again," she replied frankly.  "I guess we'll be friends for
+ten minutes and you shall show me your views."
+
+They sat down, and he opened an enormous album, but after the first few
+pages she looked up at him entreatingly, and said with a delightful
+little air of pathos:
+
+"I'm so sorry, but if you only knew how I hate sitting still.  I--I'm
+just dying to prowl round, and look at all the queer things on the
+walls."
+
+He closed the book with a laugh, and she sprang up at once, saying:
+
+"I'll look at the views when I'm old and rheumaticky.  You must save
+them for me," and then she went into raptures over a beautiful case of
+foreign butterflies, afterward fingering with delight his guns and
+swords.
+
+"You ought to have been a man," he said almost regretfully.
+
+"Why, of course I ought.  I've known that ever since they put Jack in
+trousers, and not me.  But I guess I'll have to stay a woman now to the
+end of the chapter, and make the best of it."
+
+"Then you're sorry?" he asked, with interest.
+
+"Sorry!" she repeated impressively.  "Oh, yes, I'm that all right, but I
+don't believe in crying over spilt milk."
+
+He watched her silently a moment.
+
+"I shouldn't wonder if you haven't got a future, Paddy," he remarked.
+"There's something about you that has the ring of achievement--only
+there's not much room here," signifying the surrounding neighbourhood.
+"Quite room enough," picking up a Mauser pistol and examining it with
+the eye of a connoisseur.  "Can't I ride straight, and shoot straight,
+and sail anything with a rag and a mast--that's achievement enough for
+me.  What more do you want?"
+
+He drew a bow at a venture, out of idle curiosity.  "I wonder where the
+opposite sex will come in?  Don't you want to have adoring males at your
+feet by and by!--most women do."
+
+She looked frankly into his eyes with a gay laugh.  "Not me!  I haven't
+time.  I'll leave that for Eileen.  Of course, if your lordship--!" with
+a sudden irresistible twinkle.
+
+He could not help laughing, and watched her with growing interest as she
+wandered on from one curio to another, until she came to his writing
+table.  Here she came to a sudden standstill, and a little involuntary
+exclamation escaped her.  Lawrence looked past her quickly, to find she
+was gazing with wide eyes, and a strangely mingled expression, at the
+beautiful full-length portrait of Gwendoline Carew, noticeably in the
+position of honour on his table.
+
+CHAPTER FIFTEEN.
+
+DREAD AND WRATH.
+
+"Who is she?" she asked at last, with her customary out-spokenness.
+
+"Do you mean the big portrait?" carelessly.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Miss Gwendoline Grant-Carew."
+
+Paddy gazed at the portrait silently for another space, and then
+remarked:
+
+"She is very beautiful."
+
+"Yes, very," dryly.
+
+Again Paddy was silent.
+
+If she had tried she could not have analysed her feelings just then.
+She was only conscious that in some way the photograph was a shock to
+her.  Though she had scarcely confessed it to herself, she undoubtedly
+shared the opinion of the neighbourhood, that Lawrence was paying Eileen
+such marked attention with a view to marriage, and since the incident of
+the clasped hands she had grown to think of him as a prospective
+brother-in-law.  Unaccountable divination told her the rest.
+
+"Why do you look at her like that?" asked Lawrence at last.  "Don't you
+like her?"
+
+"No," said Paddy slowly, "I hate her."
+
+"But how can you," he laughed, "when you don't even know her?  As a
+matter of fact she is just your sort.  Up to any fun, full of life, and
+not the least bit conceited, though half Calcutta is at her feet."
+
+"Calcutta," echoed Paddy a little sharply.
+
+"Yes, why not?"
+
+Again there was a moment's silence.
+
+"Doreen told me you were going to India," she said at last.  "Is it
+true?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+He picked up a paper knife and toyed with it.  Something in Paddy's
+honest face made him avoid her gaze.
+
+"When are you going?" she asked.
+
+"In about three weeks."
+
+She gulped down an exclamation.
+
+"For long?"
+
+"What a list of questions!" with light sarcasm; "it feels like an
+examination paper."
+
+But Paddy would not be put off.  She fidgeted restlessly with a letter
+weight, and then asked again:
+
+"Are you going for long?"
+
+"I haven't the least idea."
+
+"And this--er--Miss Gwendoline Grant-Carew," with a slight curl of her
+lips, "you are engaged to her, or--going to be?"
+
+"Can't a man have a chum's photograph on his table without being engaged
+to her?"
+
+"I don't know.  I am not a man."
+
+There was a long pause, then she added: "I don't know much about men,
+either, but I believe a good many of them think it very amusing and
+entertaining to make love to three or four girls at once, and not care a
+snap of their fingers for any one of them.  It may be amusing, but to my
+thinking, it is the trick of a scoundrel.  I'd hate such a man," and she
+tossed her head and drew up her slight form, with a defiance that was
+almost a challenge.
+
+Lawrence paled slightly, but he watched her with his keen eyes in a way
+that bespoke a sudden and unusual interest.
+
+He tried, however, to counteract the sense of strain in the situation,
+by chaffing her.
+
+"I believe your real name is Patricia," he said, "but this is the first
+time I have seen you look the part.  I shall have to start calling you
+`Patricia the Great.'"
+
+She flashed a glance of scorn at him.
+
+"`Patricia,' to me, means loyalty," she said, with significance.  "You
+may call me what you like, but whether it is Paddy or Patricia,
+`loyalty' is my watchword."
+
+He felt almost as if she had struck him.  As if a glove, flung
+passionately down, should lie on the floor between them.  He got up from
+his chair, and half turned away, at a momentary loss for words.
+
+"I hear the band," she said, and moved toward the door.
+
+And it was noticeable this time that Lawrence had not heard it, and
+instead of leading he followed.  Moreover, there was something about
+Paddy's manner that forebade him offering his arm, and at the ball-room
+door she turned her back on him without a word, and commenced chattering
+to her next partner.
+
+It would be difficult to describe the feelings of the different
+occupants of the omnibus which took the party from the Vicarage and the
+Ghan House home again that night, but undoubtedly the elder folks were
+now the gayest.
+
+The General was very lively, doubtless because he had got through the
+evening without the dreaded mishap to his clothes, and was at the same
+time relieved from the weight of anxiety they occasioned.
+
+Miss Jane had enjoyed herself immensely, and was lively also, and even
+little Miss Mary was aroused to an unusual gaiety for her.  Mrs Adair
+saw the subdued light of happiness glowing in Eileen's eyes, and anxiety
+gave place to hopefulness.
+
+But for Paddy and Jack, there was only increased dread, though they both
+strove bravely to continue to hide it beneath an assumed merriment.
+
+Paddy saw, as her mother, the light in Eileen's eyes, and something
+seemed to grow cold within her, and she bit her teeth together,
+murmuring savagely, "I'll kill him, if he's been trifling with her."
+
+Jack saw it, too, and his hopes grew weak, for he believed he was
+already worsted; and he saw, with an inward yearning, the vision of all
+the happy, careless, sunny days at Omeath passing slowly and surely
+away.  "What should he do?" he asked, "and where should he go?"
+
+His two devoted aunts noticed there was something wrong later on, before
+separating for the night, and in Miss Jane's bedroom, they asked each
+other anxiously.
+
+"What is it?--what is wrong with our boy?"
+
+Miss Mary having the greater intuition, was the first to offer a
+solution.  "Can it be Eileen?" she asked with dread--"Eileen and
+Lawrence Blake?"
+
+They looked into each other's eyes with a sudden sense of awakening.
+
+"Surely not--" murmured Miss Jane, but her face belied her words.
+
+"Oh, sister," breathed little tender-hearted Miss Mary, "if it is true
+he will suffer so.  I can't bear to think of our boy suffering," and two
+big tears gathered in her eyes.
+
+"Don't fret, sister," said Miss Jane bravely, blinking back a suspicious
+moisture in her own eyes, "I don't think it can have gone far enough for
+that.  You see we have lately somehow associated Eileen and Lawrence,
+and Jack, of course, knew, so he would be guarded against caring too
+much.  Probably it is just the sudden realisation that a change must
+come over their old happy life, and he will quickly get accustomed to
+it.  There is still Paddy, and I have always hoped so--" she paused, and
+then concluded with a little smile, "What a dear, wild, irresponsible
+pair they would make!"
+
+Across at The Ghan House, in a room from which a bright light shone
+through the trees, in view of Jack's window, the two other sisters were
+taking off their pretty dresses, and preparing to slip into their two
+dainty little white beds.  Now and then they laughed over something that
+had happened at the ball, but for the most part Eileen was dreamy and
+Paddy preoccupied.
+
+"Was Lawrence very nice to-night?" asked the latter at last, longing to
+know what had transpired.
+
+"Yes," Eileen answered simply.  Paddy looked round suddenly and opened
+her lips to speak, but something in her sister's face held her back.
+
+She was going to ask if he had told her about going to India, but
+realising how it might hurt Eileen if he had not, she changed her mind.
+
+"I can't--I can't," she said to herself.  "She looks so happy.  I can't
+damp it; if he has been playing with her, I will kill him--kill him--
+kill him," and she clenched her hands together and tumbled into bed,
+forgetting for the time her own trouble in her wrath against Lawrence.
+
+CHAPTER SIXTEEN.
+
+THE FIRST AWAKENING.
+
+It was through her father, a few days later, that Eileen first heard of
+Lawrence's plans.  He came blustering in from his usual daily walk one
+morning and exclaimed:
+
+"That fellow Lawrence is off again--going back to India to kill a few
+more tigers--never knew such a chap--can't stay quiet scarcely a month--
+pity he doesn't look after his estate at home, I think, instead of
+gadding off over the seas again, and I nearly told him so."
+
+Mrs Adair, at the first words, had looked up in surprise, but Paddy,
+who was interested in a small sailing boat at the window, turned and
+covertly watched Eileen.  As she half expected, she saw her turn deadly
+pale, as if the news were a shock, and Paddy knew at once that Lawrence
+had not told her the evening of the dance, although his plans were
+already formed, and she hated him yet more vigorously.
+
+Meanwhile, Mrs Adair asked wonderingly:
+
+"Are you sure you are right, dear!  Nothing was said about it the
+evening of the dance."
+
+"I had it from Lawrence himself half an hour ago.  I asked him if he
+would aid me in getting something done to the drainage in Omeath, and he
+said he would give me a subscription, but he was going away himself for
+some time.  He then told me he was going to India in three weeks."
+
+Eileen looked up.  A sudden thought had come to her.
+
+"It must have been decided in a great hurry?" she said a little
+questioningly, and hung on the General's reply.
+
+"No," came only too promptly.  "It was all arranged before he came back
+to Omeath.  I don't know why he did not mention it sooner, but he is
+never one to talk of his arrangements.  If I had only known, I would
+have hurried on this scheme of sanitation, for I want his personal
+support as well as his money.  It is very tiresome.  Bless the man! he's
+like a wandering organ-grinder."
+
+There was a pause, and presently Eileen rose and left the room.  Her
+mother's eyes followed her with a look of suffering, but Paddy bit her
+teeth together and said under her breath: "I'll kill him yet."
+
+Half an hour later they all sat down to lunch, and Eileen joined them
+with just her usual calm manner; only the shadows under her eyes had
+deepened, and she seemed to avoid every one's glance.
+
+After lunch she and Paddy were alone for a few minutes, and Paddy asked
+with seeming carelessness:
+
+"Didn't Lawrence tell you he was going to India, shortly?"
+
+"I don't think so," very quietly.  "He may have, but if so I didn't
+catch what he was saying.
+
+"I am not very surprised," she continued with an effort, "as he said
+something about not staying at home long when they first returned."
+
+Paddy was non-plussed.
+
+She had hardly expected Eileen to take it so calmly, and being at a loss
+for an answer she wisely dropped the subject.
+
+Presently she went in search of Jack.
+
+"Have you heard that Lawrence is going to India in three weeks?" she
+asked him.
+
+"The General told me this morning," replied Jack.  "I can't say I'm
+particularly sorry."
+
+He was sitting on a gate that overlooked the bay, and Paddy leaned
+against the top rail beside him.
+
+"I didn't suppose you would be," she retorted; "but it's not very nice
+for Eileen."
+
+"Why not?" setting his mouth squarely, with an obstinate expression.
+
+"Well, you know a lot of the people about here think they're engaged."
+
+"And if they do--isn't it a thundering good thing they're wrong?"
+
+"No, it isn't," getting nettled.  "If Lawrence has been trifling with
+Eileen I'll kill him."
+
+"Eileen has too much sense to care for a man who would behave so."
+
+"You don't know anything about it.  You're just a great, big, blundering
+baby," and Paddy looked as if she were on the point of tears.
+
+"Whew!" whistled Jack.  "What have I been doing now?"
+
+"Nothing, and that's just it.--If I were a man--if I were Eileen's
+brother, I'd shoot Lawrence.  She hasn't got a brother, but you're the
+next best thing and you ought to do it."
+
+"I fail to see how I could benefit Eileen by getting myself hanged."
+
+"I don't care," exclaimed Paddy.  "I don't care for any of you.  I'll
+have it out with Lawrence some day, and make him pay for this."
+
+"My dear child! you're making no end of a fuss about nothing,"
+sententiously.
+
+"Child!" echoed Paddy derisively.  "And I should like to know what
+you've ever done to prove yourself a man."
+
+Jack was so astonished, for a moment he could hardly speak.  In all
+their lives he had never known Paddy adopt that tone to him, and he
+regarded her as if she had suddenly developed into a new species of wild
+animal.
+
+"Oh, you needn't look like that," ran on poor Paddy, getting more and
+more beside herself with exasperation; "you know perfectly well you are
+little better than a mere boy.  If you had gone out into the world like
+other men, and made a way for yourself, you might have come back and won
+Eileen, and saved her from all that's coming.  And instead, you have
+just sat still and stared at her, and let another man come in and spoil
+everything!--and you call that loving!  If you'd any possible chance of
+providing a home in a year or two, you might be able to do something
+even now, but there you sit a mere boy at twenty-five years, and nothing
+achieved except a good aim and a good yachtsman."
+
+Jack was struck dumb.
+
+For a moment they both forgot that Paddy herself had been one of the
+principal supporters in his idleness--each in his own way saw only his
+pain.
+
+He got down from the gate slowly.
+
+"Good Lord, Paddy!" he said, "I believe you're right," and without
+stopping or looking back, he strode off across the garden toward the
+mountains with his forehead wrinkled into two perpendicular lines.
+
+Paddy watched him a moment, and then rushed away to a lovely little cove
+by the shore, and throwing herself down on a bank burst into tears.
+
+She did not quite know what she was crying about, but when she finally
+sat up and dried her eyes she felt better, and was able to review the
+situation more calmly.
+
+"Perhaps, after all, Lawrence would soon be back," she argued, "and she
+was making a great fuss needlessly.  Or perhaps Eileen did not care so
+much as she imagined, and things would all come right yet."
+
+At this point she was aroused by voices, and along the little path
+through the trees, she descried Eileen and Lawrence coming toward her.
+
+"Lawrence was just telling me about his trip," Eileen said pleasantly.
+"He is going to have a splendid tour.  I think he is very wise to go
+about and see the world while he can, don't you?"
+
+Paddy did not answer, and somehow Lawrence carefully avoided meeting her
+eyes.  Eileen's pluck was making him feel less pleased with himself than
+anything else could have done.  They had met accidentally in the
+afternoon, and she had immediately, in a charming way, congratulated him
+upon his good fortune in being able to start off travelling again.
+
+He had been a little surprised and a little chagrined, but he had been
+nearer loving her then, than ever before.
+
+Paddy's quick eyes saw at once how matters stood, and she followed
+Eileen's lead.
+
+Thus for the present, Eileen managed to blind the loving, watchful eyes
+of the home circle.
+
+Only to her beloved mountains, and that distant strip of turquoise,
+which was the sea, she remained still herself and hid nothing.  In her
+lonely little nook, high up on the mountain side, with the dear wonder
+of loveliness that she so loved, spread out around her, she passed
+through the first of those weary Gethsemanes, that sap the joy out of
+young lives for a season.
+
+At first it was so incredible to her.  Had he not looked his love so
+often!--shown it in so many ways!--done everything, in fact, except
+confessed it!  And if it were all a mistake, if he had meant none of it,
+how base then he must be.
+
+This hurt her the most.  She had never idealised him, she had rigidly
+made herself see his failings, but because she had believed them only
+the result of past circumstances and companions, and believed his love
+would soon lift him above them, she had given him of her best in spite
+of all.
+
+But now everything was changed.  Of a surety he did not love her.
+
+Sometimes, remembering a passage here and a passage there--a look here,
+a look there--a touch, a tone, a sentence--her whole soul rose up and
+cried: "It is false, it is a mistake, he does love me, oh! he does--he
+does--he does--"
+
+There would be a short space of passionate hope, and then calm reason
+would step in and say with inexorable firmness: "How can that be, since
+he goes away for no particular reason to the other side of the world,
+when everything at home needs his presence?"
+
+Then would follow a period of terrible self-depreciation, when poor
+Eileen's sensitive nature shrank back horrified from the thought of all
+she had given unasked--and her cheeks burned with a deep sense of shame
+that she had allowed herself to believe in love where apparently no love
+was.
+
+Small wonder that her heart grew faint within her.  The mountains
+understood, and the bay, and the lights and shadows, and the strip of
+turquoise--or it seemed to the sad dreamer that they did--and so upon
+every possible occasion she stole away to the solitude, to look out upon
+them all with a world of pain in her beautiful eyes, suffering mutely
+and alone.
+
+Once or twice her mother had been about to speak, but with quick
+divination Eileen had seen and stayed her.  The wound was too sore yet
+to bear any probing.  She felt, at least, she must suffer alone.
+
+"My child, you are looking ill," her mother said at last, and there was
+a tremor in her voice that went to Eileen's heart.
+
+"I am quite well, mother dear," she answered in that patient way of
+hers.  "You must not trouble about me; there is no need for it."
+
+For answer Mrs Adair put her hand on the bright head beside her.
+
+"I understand, my girlie," she said in a pain-wrung voice.  "I
+understand so well.  God bless and help you and comfort you."
+
+Eileen could not trust herself to speak, but afterward she thanked God
+that He had given her so dear a mother.
+
+So the three weeks passed, and Lawrence came to say good-by.  He would
+gladly have escaped the ordeal, but that he saw was impossible, so he
+drove over with his mother the last afternoon, at her suggestion.  He
+need not have minded, for there was no change in anyone.  Mrs Adair was
+far too proud to show by word or sign any symptom of her feelings, and
+both she and Eileen went through the afternoon with brave, smiling faces
+and perfectly natural manners.
+
+Only when he was alone with Eileen for a few moments was there any
+constraint.  Then, in spite of herself, she was white to the lips, and
+her hands played nervously.
+
+Lawrence watched her covertly, and for the first time in his life felt a
+cur.
+
+"Good-by," she said, to break the almost unbearable silence, looking up
+with an effort at brightness.
+
+He took her outstretched hand and looked hard into her eyes.
+
+"Good-by, Eileen," he answered, and hesitated a moment as if he would
+fain say something else.  Then he suddenly dropped her hand, and went
+out to see about the horses.
+
+Paddy was in the stables petting them with sugar and apples, and
+stroking lovingly their smooth, glossy coats, for she had a passionate
+love for all animals.  When Lawrence came in she glanced over her
+shoulder, and, seeing who it was, turned her back to him, and continued
+playing with the horses.
+
+Lawrence watched her a moment, and the thought crossed his mind that in
+fire and spirit she was a good match for them.
+
+The man went to pull out the phaeton, and Lawrence loosened the
+headstalls, speaking in a low, winsome voice to his pets.  Both horses
+immediately looked round, and playfully bit at his coat-sleeve.  Paddy
+at the same time drew aside.  The voice that enticed them, evidently
+repulsed her.
+
+Lawrence glanced over one glossy back, with a slightly amused
+expression, and remarked:
+
+"I am not universally hated; you see.  Castor and Pollux put up with me,
+in spite of my manifest shortcomings."
+
+"You feed them," she retorted.  "All animals love the hand that gives
+them food."
+
+"Ah!  I see we are to part enemies!"
+
+"Better an honest enemy than a false friend," icily.
+
+"Yet I'm rather sorry," he went on.  "I like you much too well to want
+to look upon you as my enemy."
+
+"I do not feel as flattered as you may suppose.  It seems to me there is
+little enough to gain in being your friend."
+
+"Very likely," and he shrugged his shoulders with a sudden return of his
+old cynicism.  "This seems likely to prove a striking illustration of my
+pet theory that it is wisest not to care.  I had, forgotten it for the
+moment."
+
+The horses were harnessed and the man stood at their heads ready to lead
+them round to the door.
+
+"Go on," said Lawrence, "I will follow."
+
+He turned again to Paddy.
+
+"You have far more occasion to be glad than angry," he said, "but it is
+hardly likely you will see it yet.  By and by--say in five years' time--
+you will understand.  At present you do not know your world."
+
+"Nothing will change my estimate of you," she answered cuttingly.  "I
+wish Miss Gwendoline, what's-her-name--Carew, joy of her bargain."
+
+"Now we are descending to personalities," with a fine sneer, "so perhaps
+I had better depart."
+
+"A most excellent notion, O Theophilus!" tossing her small head.
+
+A gleam of admiration came unbidden to his eyes.
+
+"You're good stuff, Paddy," he said, almost under his breath.  "I like
+your fieryness uncommon well."
+
+"That is how I like your absence," came quick as lightning.
+
+"Well, good-by," and he held out his hand.
+
+She put hers behind her, with unmistakable meaning.
+
+He shrugged his shoulders expressively, and turned away.
+
+When he had gone a few paces, he looked back.  She was still standing
+where he had left her.  A sudden instinct brought him again to her side.
+"Don't be a little fool, Paddy!  Come, be friends.  I may never come
+back."
+
+"It is not of the smallest consequence to me whether you do or not."
+She still stood with her hands behind her, and her eyes never once
+wavered before his.  He could not choose but admire her dauntless
+attitude, now she had declared war.  He hesitated a moment, unwilling to
+show himself beaten.  Then he gave a little laugh.
+
+"I declare--I believe you've given me an object in life.  It will be
+quite entertaining, some day, to break down your defences."  He looked
+into her face.  "Do you hear, Patricia, when I come back, I shall storm
+the fortress, and make you cry Peace yet.  Will you have a bet on it?"
+
+"No," unbendingly, "I do not care to bet with you."  She hesitated a
+second, and then finished with unflinching gaze: "I despise you."
+
+CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.
+
+BROODING CLOUDS.
+
+There was a shadow upon the Parsonage.  The two little ladies looked at
+each other with vague dismay, and asked wonderingly, "What is this that
+has come upon us?"
+
+At meal times Jack was nearly always gloomy and preoccupied, or if he
+was gay his merriment was evidently forced.  Between meals he went for
+long, lonely tramps, and constantly those two perpendicular lines
+wrinkled his forehead.  Strangest of all, he seemed to avoid The Ghan
+House, and Paddy was no longer his constant companion.
+
+"Could we ask him, do you think, sister?" little Miss Mary suggested
+timidly.
+
+But Miss Jane shook her head mournfully.  They were feeling rather as
+the hen who has reared ducklings when they first take to water.  This
+docile, careless-hearted, affectionate boy they had reared, had suddenly
+become a man, and in one stride passed beyond their tender, watchful
+care.  Illness and weakness alone could ever bring him back as he had
+been.  His troubles, his warfare, his striving, he would henceforth
+wrestle with alone.
+
+Moreover, there was Eileen's white face and deeply shadowed eyes also.
+Nothing was said--what was there to say?  Only anxious, watchful nights
+and yearning pain for another mother, whose fledgling was feeling the
+first cold blast of Life's sorrow.
+
+Mrs Adair's abundant hair, that had been turning grey of late, seemed
+to go white suddenly in those weeks that followed the dance.  She had
+borne so much; from a very early age Life had held the cup of pain to
+her lips, and she had tried to drink and ask no questions.  But now, it
+seemed to her that she had met the hardest blow of all.  Eileen was all
+the world to her.  Long ago, when life was full of sadness in spite of
+her good husband and beautiful home--for the sake of the man whose blood
+had stained the ground on that far-off Afghan frontier, Eileen's baby
+face had come as her first real comforter, and been life and joy and
+sweetness to her ever since.  Perhaps it was a vague, inward
+consciousness of this that made the father's heart turn with equal
+devotion to his high-spirited, boisterous second daughter; while never
+swerving for a moment from his devotion to her mother.
+
+But now Eileen's cheeks grew white, and her beautiful eyes developed an
+expression of quiet suffering that went to her mother's heart as little
+else could have done, and made Paddy rage inwardly.
+
+Until Lawrence had gone away again, and the old routine recommenced, she
+had not known how much she had thought of him during his three years'
+absence.  All that time she had cared for him secretly, though she had
+hardly admitted it to herself.  Then when he came, and again sought her
+before all others, and gave her of the best of his charm, it was only as
+the match needed for the whole to burst into flame.
+
+Vanishing once more, in silence and suddenness, he had left her with all
+her dreams and hopes and happiness scattered broadcast at her feet.
+
+There were moments when she could not understand, when even her
+mountains and sky and sea could do nothing to soothe the whirlpool of
+conflicting emotions in her heart.
+
+"Why?--why?--why?"--she asked, and raised despairing eyes to the heavens
+that only seemed to smile mockingly down.
+
+She could not vent her feelings in anger like Paddy--least of all anger
+with Lawrence--so in her misery she became a prey to those questionings
+and reasonings which torment each soul confronted suddenly by some
+strange enigma of existence.  Questions of faith, questions of doubt,
+all the boundless "why and wherefore" of daily being thronged round and
+hammered unceasingly at her brain, stealing the delicate colour from her
+cheeks, the light from her eyes, and the elasticity from her steps.
+
+In those first troubled days it was curious how Jack and Eileen both
+turned to the mountains, the one for their companionship, and the other
+for air.  Jack's troubled horizon made him feel as if he could not
+breathe--it was like something gripping at his throat; so he strode off
+up the mountain, where he felt there was more air and a wider sense of
+freedom.  It was torture to him to see Eileen's white face and flagging
+health, and not be able to do anything; and ever since Paddy's outburst
+he had been ravaged by the thought that had he accepted a man's
+responsibilities sooner, instead of frittering away his life, he might
+possibly have been in a position to oust Lawrence before matters had
+grown serious.
+
+Paddy watched the two of them, and the ache in her heart deepened also;
+the ache for herself, the ache for Eileen, the ache for him.  And with
+it widened and deepened also her bitterness toward Lawrence.
+
+Suddenly in the midst of their joyous life, it was as though a cloud of
+darkest menace had descended, and she blamed him entirely.  Hopeful by
+nature, she still cherished the belief that things would come all right
+by and by, and meanwhile she spent nearly all her time with the General.
+
+In some way he seemed ailing, and one or two spasms, like heart
+seizures, had given them all a fright.  Mrs Adair did not like him to
+go about too much alone for fear of another attack, so, as she was not
+strong enough to walk far herself, Paddy quickly fell into the habit of
+going with him every day.  Eileen would gladly have gone, but she could
+not chatter like Paddy, and she knew, without feeling the smallest pang
+of jealousy, which of them the father liked best for a companion.  It
+only seemed natural to her that it should be so, for she had such an
+admiration for Paddy's brightness that she felt everyone must in their
+hearts prefer her.
+
+So while sorrow drew Eileen and her mother closer together, failing
+health did the same for Paddy and her father.  Day after day, in any
+weather, the pair might be seen pacing the road either to Carlingford or
+Newry--the grey-haired, soldierly man, somewhat bent now, leaning on
+Paddy's arm, and the bright-eyed girl chattering briskly all the time
+about anything or nothing.
+
+Sometimes the General would tell her about his campaigns, of which she
+never wearied, or he would go further back still and tell her of the old
+days at Sandhurst and Aldershot and all the wild things he had done
+then.  Once he brought the quick tears to her eyes by saying:
+
+"Ah, Paddy! they were grand times, and I'd have liked you to go through
+them; yet where would I have been for a walking stick now?  I expect the
+Almighty knew best.  I married too late in life to be trusted with a
+son.  Boys want a father who can be a boy with them, and not a crotchety
+old man who needs caring for like a child.  It's hard, enough on the
+girls--eh, Paddy!--a father who's too old and decrepit to take them
+anywhere or be anything but a burden!"
+
+Paddy stood still suddenly.  There were tears in her eyes, but she
+frowned like some ferocious Medusa.
+
+"How dare you!" she said sternly.  "How dare you speak to me like that!
+If you ever say anything of the kind again, you bad, wicked daddy, I
+shall just march you back home and not speak to you for a week."
+
+The General smiled tenderly.
+
+"Do you now, Paddy," he said a little wistfully, "before you came, I
+used sometimes to think I'd done the wrong thing in persuading your
+mother to many me.  You see, I loved her so; I was certain I could soon
+make her forget and love again.  But women's hearts are wonderful
+things.  I'm thinking God didn't make anything else quite as wonderful,
+and it wasn't her fault that she couldn't forget.  But she was always
+just goodness itself to me, and there was no sacrifice she would not
+have made willingly to please me; but after a time I found it wasn't any
+good, for I still felt she was mourning secretly.  I couldn't bear her
+to be unhappy, you see, and feel I couldn't help it.  At first I thought
+if she would only come to me, and let me have the right to take care of
+her always, that in itself would be a world of happiness.  Afterward I
+found it wasn't enough.  I wanted more of her love.  When Eileen was
+born she was brighter and happier altogether, and at first I was
+content.  Then I began to feel a little jealous of the newcomer who had
+succeeded where I had failed, and to feel a new sense of loneliness."
+
+"Poor daddy," Paddy said lovingly.  "I expect God said to Himself, `I
+must send him something now that won't leave him time to think--the very
+naughtiest, unmanageable child that can possibly live; and I'll make it
+a girl instead of a boy, so that she'll be a good walking stick later
+on.'  And behold! there was Paddy."
+
+"Yes, yes, that's just it," he exclaimed delightedly, "the naughtiest,
+unmanageable child imaginable--that's just what you were--and Lord! how
+I revelled in it!  The first time I saw your bright, blinking brown
+eyes, and your ugly little face--for you were a very ugly baby, Paddy--
+my heart just went straight out to you, for I felt you at least were
+absolutely my own.  Eileen was afraid of me; she wouldn't leave her
+mother if she could help it, but you seemed to like the old man the best
+from the start.  You would lie in my arms and stare up at me with the
+sauciest expression, as much as to say, `Just wait till I'm a bit
+bigger, I'll lead you a dance.'  Then you would grab at my moustache and
+hang on like grim death; or you would start kicking out of pure
+mischief, and land out right and left like a little demon, till I was
+afraid I'd drop you.  When you could toddle I was little better than a
+nursemaid, for there wasn't a dangerous spot you wouldn't immediately
+make for.  The moment anyone's back was turned you were missing, and it
+was a dead certainty you had found your way on to the quay, or taken a
+stroll along the railway, or tumbled into the cucumber frame.  I
+couldn't bear to go far for fear you would get into danger, and there'd
+be no one at hand to save you, so I just hung round the grounds all the
+time; and ever since then, Paddy, I've been as happy as a man need be,
+for somehow things drew your mother and me closer together."
+
+"Then we've all been happy, daddy, and that's good, isn't it?  The
+aunties, and Jack, and you and mother, and Eileen and me, just the
+jolliest family party in the world."
+
+The General was silent a few moments, then he said, with a little tremor
+in his voice, "I'm thinking it can't go on, Paddy."
+
+"Can't go on!" with a sharp spasm of unknown dread.  "Why not?--O why
+not?"
+
+The old man did not answer.  Instead, after another pause, he continued:
+
+"When anything happens to me, Paddy, you'll try and look after your
+mother just as if you were a son, won't you?  It will be hard on you,
+but you're so plucky.  I know you'll do your best.  You'll always
+remember your old daddy worshipped her, and nothing'll be too hard then
+for a brave girl like you."
+
+"Daddy, you are not to talk like this," laughing that she might not cry.
+"We'll be all together years and years yet."
+
+"I hope so, Paddy--I hope so, but I'm an old man and there's no making
+the old young again in this world.  You'll remember about being a good
+son, eh!"
+
+"Of course I will, daddy.  I'll just work like a slave to give her
+everything she wants, but we won't talk about it now," and she cleverly
+changed the subject.
+
+That evening a third seizure took the General, and Jack was called in
+hurriedly to help to get him upstairs to his bed.
+
+CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.
+
+THE ANGEL OF DEATH.
+
+Through four long, weary days, and four long, weary nights, the brave
+old soldier fought his last and hardest fight; and all the time Paddy
+never left him.
+
+When the others broke down under the strain, she was strong still;
+strong and calm, as she felt he would have been had he been in her
+place.  She knew it was the last thing she could do for him to prove her
+devotion, and the thought nerved her for a strain that might well have
+vanquished older and stronger hearts.  Never once did the dying man open
+his eyes and look yearningly round without seeing the young, strong,
+pitying face of his heart's darling.
+
+But when it was all over--and with a long-drawn sigh as of great content
+the brave old General had passed away--she stood up and looked vaguely
+round with a dazed air.  Her eyes met Jack's, and with a sudden low cry
+she held out her arms to him.  Then, as he hastened to her, she broke
+down in a paroxysm of weeping, all the more terrible from the long
+restraint.
+
+With great tears in his own eyes he carried her to her own room, and
+laid her down on her own little bed, while he tried to soothe her in
+broken sentences; until little Miss Mary sent him away, saying softly it
+was better she should cry unrestrainedly.
+
+Four days later, in the presence of several hundred people, General
+Adair was laid to rest in the little churchyard of Omeath.  Every effort
+had been made to keep the funeral quiet and simple, but so familiar and
+beloved had he been, that from far and near young and old came to pay
+their last tribute of love and respect.  There was no uncalled-for
+weeping and lamenting; a spirit of solemn farewell seemed to spread over
+all, encouraged by the brave, white faces of the widow and her two
+fatherless girls.  The widow leaned on the arm of their only relative, a
+brother of the General's, Dr Adair, from London, and Eileen and Paddy
+followed together.  Jack and the two aunts came next, and that was all
+the funeral procession.
+
+It was one of those soft, sunny days that come sometimes in late
+November, as if they had been left over from summer, and must be fitted
+in somewhere; and early in the evening a young moon looked tenderly down
+through the trees upon the bereaved home and the new-made grave with the
+white wreaths spread all around.
+
+The little waves of the Loch murmured tremulously against the beach, as
+if they would fain be silent, but, since that was not possible, they
+would make their rippling upon the shingle as gentle and soothing as
+they could.  The tall trees stood like sentinels; now and then a little
+breathing whisper passed through their scanty leaves, but there was no
+unseemly tossing or creaking to mar the solemn silence.  In the
+distance, all around, the Mourne Mountains reared their heads to the
+starlit heavens in a sublimity of majestic steadfastness.  It was,
+indeed, an eve of surpassing loveliness that commenced the watch of that
+first night around the flower-strewn grave, lulling with ineffable
+sweetness the last, long sleep of the fine old warrior.
+
+It crept with a tender soothing into Paddy's aching heart also as she
+silently threaded her way through the shrubs and gravestones to the spot
+where the flowers lay.  The peacefulness of it all, the sense of a work
+well done and all Nature offering tribute--her sure and certain hope
+that it was indeed well with her father--kept her eyes serene and her
+face calm, although there was a drawn look about her mouth that went to
+the aunties' hearts.
+
+When she reached the grave, she stopped and tenderly re-arranged the
+flowers, freeing some that had become twisted or crushed, and giving
+others more room to breathe.
+
+"Daddy would not like any of you to get hurt through him," she
+whispered, "and you must just try and keep fresh as long as possible."
+
+When she had finished she stood up, and a sudden terrible sense of loss
+enfolded her.
+
+"Oh, daddy, perhaps you'll be lonely in Heaven," she whispered brokenly.
+"It doesn't seem possible you can be happy without mother and Eileen
+and me.  We're so terribly lonely without you here.  I'm so afraid God
+won't be able to comfort you without us up there.  Only, perhaps, in
+some way, you are with us still.  I expect you will be our guardian
+angel now, and you'll understand all the things that are so strange and
+mysterious to us; and you'll know about the glad meeting coming, and how
+beautiful it will all be some day.  I know you won't forget or change,
+daddy, and I'm glad we should have the pain instead of you; yet, how I'd
+love you just to come and tell me that it's all beautiful, and you're
+not lost and lonely among so many strange angels.
+
+"I know it's all right, daddy, I mustn't talk like this, and you're not
+really far away at all.  I can feel you quite close, only I can't see
+you.  Daddy! daddy! how shall I bear to live for years and years without
+seeing your dear face," and she broke down into low, pitiful weeping.
+
+In the moonlight another form could be seen approaching, but Paddy was
+not aware of it until an arm was slipped through hers, and a big,
+sunburnt hand closed over her small one.  She knew at once that it was
+Jack, but for some moments neither of them spoke.  At last he cleared
+his throat and said huskily:
+
+"Your uncle has been asking for you, Paddy.  I came to look for you."
+
+"What does he want?" she asked wonderingly.  Jack hesitated a little.
+At last he said: "I think it is something you have to be told.  I'm a
+little afraid it's bad news."
+
+She started and turned a shade paler.  Then she glanced down at the
+flowers.
+
+"It seems as this were surely enough," she breathed half to herself.
+
+"I wish I could help you, Paddy," he burst out.  "I wish I could help
+you all.  If you only knew how I hate and loathe myself for having
+wasted all these years."
+
+"Poor Jack!" she said gently, and stroked the big brown hand.
+
+"You must go now," he said.  "Your uncle is waiting in the library.
+Will you come out again afterward?"
+
+"Yes.  Wait for me by the boat-house," and she turned away and crossed
+the churchyard.
+
+In the library her uncle, a kindly, strong-faced man, was anxiously
+looking for her, and when she entered he glanced keenly into her face.
+He had been hearing a good deal about her from one and another during
+the last two or three days, and it was because of a plan he had in his
+mind that his glance held such searching interest.
+
+"Did you want me, uncle?"
+
+"Yes, dear."
+
+He hesitated, then went on: "You slipped away this afternoon the moment
+I had finished reading your father's will, didn't you?"
+
+"Yes, uncle.  Ought I have stayed?"
+
+"It did not make any difference, my child, except that I must explain
+now what has passed since.  You heard, I suppose, that your father lived
+almost entirely on his pension, and that the greater part of that ceased
+at his death?"
+
+"Yes," wonderingly.
+
+"In fact, he seems to have had nothing left of his private property
+except this house and grounds, and even upon this there is a mortgage.
+At some period, though not within recent years, I think, with his usual
+kind-heartedness, he has put his name to bills for one or two brother
+officers, and they have not been met, and your father has had to pay.
+In short, my dear, your father was a noble-hearted man, but he had no
+business capacities, and what with one thing and another, you and your
+mother and sister are left very badly off."
+
+A sudden fear seemed to seize Paddy, and with dread in her eyes, she
+half whispered:
+
+"Yes, uncle.  Go on."
+
+The doctor cleared his throat and played nervously with his watch-chain.
+
+"There does not seem to be anything except your mother's pension now,
+and that is barely enough to support three."
+
+"And The Ghan House--!"
+
+What was it in Paddy's voice that made him turn away a moment and apply
+his handkerchief vigorously to his nose?  What was it in the aching
+pause that opened those eyes, wont to brim over with fun and laughter,
+wider and wider with dread?  But nothing was to be gained by delay, and
+at last the doctor said slowly:
+
+"You will have to leave The Ghan House."
+
+Paddy sat as if she had been suddenly turned to stone.  On the top of
+all the rest, this last blow fell like a death-stroke.  Her uncle gave
+her a little time to recover, and then he sat down and, resting his arms
+upon the table, leaned toward her.
+
+"Paddy, my child, it's terribly hard for you all," he said in a gentle
+voice, "but I'm so hoping you will help me to do the best for your
+mother and sister."
+
+He had touched the right chord; no other method could have gone so
+straight to Paddy's heart.  She gulped down the hard, dry sobs that
+threatened to choke her, and looking up with an effort said:
+
+"I promised daddy I would be a good son."
+
+"And I'm sure you will!" her uncle exclaimed.  "You will prove yourself
+a true Adair--your father's own flesh and blood.  You see," he continued
+more seriously, "what I am most troubled about is your future and
+Eileen's.  While your mother lives there is the pension, such as it is,
+but when she dies, you two little girls will have practically nothing--
+except an old uncle who will always do what he can."
+
+Paddy looked up gratefully, but he gave her no opportunity to speak,
+continuing immediately:
+
+"If I were a rich man, you should none of you want _for_ anything, but I
+am far from it.  We Adairs have a fatal gift of getting through money--a
+truly Irish trait--and a great part of my private means have gone in
+medical research, and my practice is in a poor parish, where I have to
+get what fees I can and leave the rest.  As you know, your aunt has a
+little money, but she has insisted upon giving Basil a most expensive
+education, and now he is only half through his exams.  He may not pass
+his final for two or three years, and meanwhile he is a great expense."
+
+He paused and there was a long silence, then Paddy looked up, and,
+steadying her voice with an effort, said:
+
+"I must earn money, uncle.  I must do something at once."
+
+The doctor knit his forehead together.  He knew only too well how, in
+spite of the widening opportunities for women of earning a livelihood,
+it is desperately hard for a young girl, fresh from the country, who has
+done nothing but play most of her life, to gain any kind of a footing in
+the ranks of women workers.
+
+"It is difficult to begin," he said, "and you have had no training."
+
+Paddy was silent.
+
+"I think it will be better to go away from this neighbourhood first," he
+began, as if feeling his way a little.
+
+"Oh, must we?" she cried.  "I think I could teach or something.  It
+would break our hearts to go away from the mountains."
+
+The doctor shook his head.
+
+"I have a plan," he said, "and you must talk it over together and let me
+know your answer in a week or two.  Comparatively recently, it has
+become usual for doctors to employ women, instead of men, as dispensers.
+There is a certain amount of studying necessary and an examination to
+be passed, but this once over, they are able to demand very good
+salaries.  You are a smart little woman, Paddy, and I have been thinking
+it would be an excellent arrangement for you all to come to London, and
+for you to fit yourself to be my dispenser.  I would pay you a hundred a
+year, and that would not only be a help to your mother, but it would
+mean that you had something substantial to fall back upon when she is
+gone."
+
+"A hundred a year!"  Paddy half gasped.  "Isn't that a great deal?"
+
+"Oh, no!" carelessly.  "It is what most dispensers get."  He knew that
+it was considerably above the salary of the average lady-dispenser, but
+he did not want Paddy or her mother to know, and in any case he believed
+she would be well worth it to him.
+
+"You must just think it over well," he said, "and let me know later what
+you decide.  If your mother does not approve, I will try to think of
+something else, but if she does, there is no time to be lost.  You must
+begin to study in January, with a view to getting through in July, and I
+will pay all the fees for you.  I was obliged to speak to you to-night,
+my dear, because I must return to London to-morrow, and I may not have
+another opportunity.  You are a brave girl.  God will help you to do the
+right," and with a suspicious moisture in his eyes he stooped and kissed
+her forehead, and went out leaving her alone.
+
+Then it was that the flood-gates were opened, and throwing herself down
+in the chair where her father had been wont to sit so often, she gave
+way to hopeless, heart-broken weeping.  She had said little enough to
+her uncle, but in reality the news had been a terrible shock to her; it
+had never entered her head for a moment that they must leave the old
+home.  Even now it seemed utterly impossible--as if it were better that
+they should all three lie quietly in the churchyard beside their beloved
+dead, than go away from the loch and the mountains and leave him there
+in the churchyard alone!
+
+When he weeping had spent itself, she remembered Jack and how he was
+waiting for her at the boat-house, but just for the moment she felt too
+exhausted to rise.  Presently, however, she dragged herself up, and with
+a long, sobbing breath, turned to the door and crept noiselessly through
+the hall to the garden, and made her way down across the railway track
+to the spot where she and Jack had met so often to go upon one of their
+many madcap escapades.  He was leaning against a post, lost in thought,
+and he started a little when her light footstep sounded on the shingle.
+
+"Is that you Paddy!" he asked.
+
+"Yes, Jack!" came the answer, and he felt vaguely that there were tears
+in her voice.
+
+He went forward with outstretched hands, and took her unresisting ones,
+trying to see into her face.
+
+"I thought you were never coming," he said.
+
+She gulped down a sob, and big tears splashed upon his hand.
+
+"What is it!" he asked, feeling cold suddenly.
+
+The little wavelets hushed their singing, a twittering bird stopped to
+listen; over the majestic sleeping mountains, the shining stars, the
+steadfast heavens, the sentinel trees, the shimmering, wistful loch,
+there seemed to spread the hush of a spirit of pain, as he heard her say
+in a trembling voice:
+
+"We have to leave The Ghan House, and the mountains, and the loch, and
+go and begin over again somewhere else."
+
+He said nothing--what was there to say!  To both of them the words were
+like a sentence of doom.
+
+CHAPTER NINETEEN.
+
+IN WHICH THE WORST CAME.
+
+The shadow upon the Parsonage had become actual distress--deep,
+poignant, all-absorbing distress.  The two little ladies still looked
+mutely at each other, while this thing that had come upon them began to
+take actual shape.  First there had been the vague anxiety for Eileen
+and Jack--then the loss of their old friend the General--then the bitter
+news that The Ghan House must be given up; and it seemed for the time
+that their cup of trouble was full.  And yet the worst was still to
+come.
+
+But it is necessary first to go back and review the events of the weary
+week that has dragged past since the flowers were laid upon the new-made
+grave in the little churchyard.
+
+There had been many consultations, and many tears, and much pain, ere it
+was finally decided the good doctor's offer must indeed be accepted, and
+early in the new year the mother and her daughters must start for London
+in order that Paddy might begin her studies at once.
+
+Meanwhile, Jack had been absent a great deal in Newry, and had returned
+always with a deeply thoughtful expression, and moved about in the
+preoccupied manner of one having some project weighing heavily upon his
+mind.
+
+One evening he had come in quickly and gone straight to his room without
+saying a word to anyone, and he had not come down again, though Miss
+Jane had gone upstairs and begged him to come and have some supper, or
+let her carry it to his room for him.
+
+"I couldn't eat anything to-night, auntie," he had answered, "but I am
+quite well.  Please don't worry about me," and poor Miss Jane had gone
+back to the dining-room with tears in her eyes, wondering what had
+happened to make their boy shut himself away even from them.
+
+"Perhaps he has seen Eileen," little Miss Mary suggested.  "I know he
+went across to The Ghan House, and as Mrs Adair is laid up, and Paddy
+had to go to Newry, there would be only Eileen about."
+
+And little Mary was right.
+
+Jack had seen Eileen.  He had had his first uninterrupted talk with her
+since her father died.  He had found her sitting alone over the library
+fire, leaning back with a tired, wasted look on her face, and a closed
+book on her knee.
+
+"May I stay!" he asked her, and she had mutely acquiesced, and he had
+closed the door, with a strange throbbing in his heart.
+
+"Won't you sit down!" she said, and he had shaken his head without
+speaking, and remained standing with his back to the fire, leaning
+against the mantelpiece, where he could watch her face the better.  He
+could see that she was looking ill, and the sight smote him.  He
+realised that, perhaps, she was suffering even more than the others.
+Indeed, it was so, if possible, for in her longing for her father, her
+heart would turn and turn piteously to Lawrence, and only feel the
+greater desolation.  Yet no word or sign escaped her.  Only that frail,
+wasted expression grew on her face, and the unchanging sadness deepened
+in her eyes.
+
+"It seems impossible that only a few weeks ago we were all so happy," he
+said at last.  "It's very hard when Life lets you go on being careless
+and light-hearted for years and years; and then, without any warning,
+suddenly grips you by the throat and makes you feel half strangled by
+the weight of it all."
+
+She did not speak, and looking straight before him he ran on:
+
+"It seems as if the death of the dear old General would have been enough
+in itself, but on the top of that comes this awful separation.  Do you
+know, Eileen, sometimes I think it can't be true--that it is too awful
+to be true--that The Ghan House should stand here and none of you in it,
+and that the sounds craning over to the Parsonage should be from other
+voices than yours.  Sometimes I feel I can't bear it; and yet I know it
+will have to be borne."
+
+Still she did not speak.  She was so tired--so tired--and what was there
+to say?
+
+"And that isn't all, Eileen," in a voice that would tremble in spite of
+himself.  "It seems somehow as if it were my fault that you have to go
+to London, and Paddy must work."
+
+"Your fault!" she asked wonderingly.
+
+"Yes, Eileen, in a way.  You see if I had taken the opportunities that I
+might have had for the asking when I was eighteen, I should probably
+have been doing very well indeed now, and been in a position to do
+something for you all."
+
+"You are very good, Jack, but it isn't likely that we should have let
+you, though we should have loved you for thinking of it."
+
+"I don't know," he said.  "Everything might have been different."  He
+paused, then added: "You know.  I think I have always loved you, Eileen,
+ever since you were a solemn-faced little girl; though it is only lately
+I have realised just all it meant.  I know I have generally ran about
+with Paddy, and been far more with her, but she was like a boy friend,
+while you were always my ideal of all that is best and sweetest in a
+woman.  It is only lately I have actually understood that all my life I
+should love you better than the whole world."
+
+"Oh, Jack!" she breathed, in a distressed voice, "please don't go on."
+
+He smiled down at her, and there was something strangely beautiful in
+his smile.
+
+"Yes, let me go on," he said.  "It does me good to speak of it.  I am
+not one of those men who feel bitter about loving when it is not
+returned, and too vain to acknowledge that it is so.  To me it is such a
+simple, natural thing to love you; and such an unlikely possibility that
+you should return my love.  Perhaps, if I had been more of a man the
+last nine years, and had started to make my way in the world, and then
+come to you with something to offer, it might have been different; but
+now! ah! that is just the hard part of it all."
+
+"No, no, you mustn't feel like that," she cried.  "What should we have
+done without you?--what would the aunties have done?--and I don't think
+it would have made any difference, Jack."
+
+He looked at her searchingly.
+
+"If there is someone else, Eileen, perhaps not, and yet--and yet--how
+often have you lectured me about being idle and good-for-nothing!  Would
+to Heaven I had awakened, and listened to you sooner."
+
+She buried her face in her hands.
+
+"I suppose I ought not to ask if there is someone else," he said,
+watching her.  "It would sound like an impertinence, wouldn't it?"
+
+"Oh, Jack, don't talk like this," she begged.  "Please, please forget
+about me.  It hurts me so much to feel that I am hurting you."
+
+"No, I can't forget," he answered very firmly.  "I don't want to; but I
+have no right to bother you with my love, when I have nothing in the
+world to offer.  But I am going away, Eileen.  I am going right away out
+of the country altogether, and some day, if I have succeeded, I shall
+come back; and if you are free I shall tell you again what I have told
+you to-day."
+
+"You are going away!" she repeated incredulously, sitting up and gazing
+at him with questioning eyes.  "Going away!--out of the country!"
+
+"Yes.  I ought to have gone before."
+
+"But the aunties, Jack!--whatever will the aunties do?"
+
+"I am afraid they will feel it very much, but I know they will
+understand, and I must go."
+
+"But where to?  Have you actually arranged it?"
+
+"Yes.  There is a man is Newry named Wilkinson--I don't know if you know
+him.  He is home from the Argentine for a few months' holiday.  He has a
+large cattle ranch out there, and he wants me to go back with him.  I
+have decided to go."
+
+"Oh, Jack!" was all she could say.  "Need it have been so far?"
+
+"Beggars can't be choosers," with a wintry smile.  "I believe it is a
+good thing.  Wilkinson is a nice fellow, and he has done very well in
+the ten years he has been out there.  We were chums at school, you know,
+and he offers me a better job than anyone else would."
+
+"Poor aunties!  It will half kill them."
+
+There was a long silence, then Jack spoke again:
+
+"I hoped--perhaps--that is," he began hesitatingly--"Eileen, couldn't
+you give me one word of hope to live on all the years I must be away?"
+He drew nearer and sat on the arm of her chair, as he had so often done
+through the time they had grown up together.  "You'll miss me a little,
+perhaps, and wish I could come back sooner--tell me, Eileen, that you'll
+miss me."
+
+"We shall miss you terribly, Jack," she answered, struggling to keep
+back the tears.  "England will not be the same without you.  Mother and
+Paddy and I will miss you terribly."
+
+"Is that all?"
+
+He leant forward and clasped one hand over both hers, looking hard into
+her face.
+
+"Is that all, Eileen!" and his voice was a prayer.
+
+"I'm afraid so, Jack.  Oh!  I wouldn't have hurt you like this for the
+world.  I never dreamt!  I never thought!  Are you sure you mean it,
+Jack?--Isn't it just a dream or something?"
+
+"No, it is not a dream--I mean every word of it--but there is nothing
+for you to blame yourself about, and you must never do so.  I think,
+perhaps, there is someone else--I was half afraid--only I wanted so to
+think it was a mistake."
+
+There was another long pause, and tears rolled slowly down Eileen's
+white cheeks.
+
+"I wish I could think that you were happy," he said painfully.  "It
+makes things worse going away and feeling that you are breaking your
+heart.  It isn't as if he were worth it.  I don't even think he could
+make you happy if he tried; he's too set in his own ways and opinions."
+
+"Don't, Jack, please," she said.  "It is better not to bring any other
+name into our talk."
+
+"I am sorry.  Forgive me.  Only it's so much more terrible than you can
+know.  It's like a raging fire in one's heart to feel as I do about it
+all.  Only it does not make any difference to my feelings for you, and I
+do not think it ever will, even if you marry him.  In any case I want
+you to feel that I am your slave wherever I am, and that nothing would
+be too much to ask me to do for you.  I shall hear of all that happens
+from the aunties, and, perhaps, Paddy will write if she has time, and
+after a few years I shall come back to see you all."
+
+He stood up, and there was a new look of determination in his handsome,
+boyish face.
+
+"I mean to try and make up for all the time I have wasted," he said,
+"and prove that there is some good stuff in me yet."
+
+"Oh, Jack! you know we all think the world of you," she urged.
+
+"I know you have all combined to spoil me ever since I was a little
+chap," with a wistful smile, "and I guess it was about time Mother Fate
+took me by the shoulders, so to speak, and pushed me out into the cold.
+
+"She seems to have started off with the hardest blows first though," he
+added.  "It just feels like a clean sweep of everything I cared for
+most.  To-morrow I must tell the aunts.  I keep putting it off, because
+I can't bear to begin, but it won't make it any easier in the end.  I
+think I'll go for a tramp now.  Trudging over the mountains helps a
+little and I feel--oh!  I feel as if nothing in heaven or earth mattered
+much because of you, Eileen," and he ground his teeth together to keep
+his self-command.  A second later, feeling himself giving way, he strode
+across the room, and, passing out, closed the door quietly behind him.
+
+Eileen rested her arms on the table, and leaning her tired head down
+upon them, sobbed her heart out in the old library.
+
+That was the night Jack went up to his room and shut himself in without
+appearing at the supper-table, and the two little ladies clasped each
+other's hands in mutely questioning distress, vaguely conscious that
+some new blow was about to fall.  The next evening he told them.
+
+They were sitting as usual, one on either side of the big, old-fashioned
+fireplace, and Miss Jane's cap had got tilted a little to one side when
+she went to the door to speak to Eliza Spencer, whose baby had the
+whooping-cough.  Miss Mary's looked to be preparing itself to follow
+suit.  They both wore little white shawls folded crosswise on their
+breasts and pinned with large Cairngorm brooches, which looked as if
+they might have come out of the Ark; and black silk mittens over their
+pretty little hands.  In the morning the shawls were grey or black, and
+the mittens of fine wool, but in the evening, all through the winter,
+they sat on each side of the fireplace, dressed precisely the same, with
+the same species of knitting in their fingers, reminding one of two
+china ornaments.  Almost ever since Jack could remember it had been the
+same, and he took in each little detail now with a new tenderness, from
+the quaint little elastic-side boots just showing on each footstool, to
+the softly waving white hair growing perceptibly thinner each year and
+the dainty caps that had such a habit of getting awry.  Until that
+evening he felt he had never quite known how dear his two second mothers
+had become to him.
+
+He sat now over by the table with his arms on a newspaper he was
+supposed to be reading.  He felt as if he could control his voice better
+if he did not come too near.
+
+For a little while they talked in their kind, sympathetic way of Eliza
+Spencer and her sick child, and then there was a breathing silence.  All
+felt that something unusual was in the air.  At last Miss Jane looked up
+from her knitting, and saw that Jack was not reading at all, but sitting
+with his eyes upon their faces, and a deeply troubled expression on his
+own.
+
+"Is there anything wrong, dear?" she asked.
+
+He cleared his throat, but the rising lump would not go, and he waited
+several moments before he answered.  A pained look came into each
+little, wrinkled face.  They knew then that something fresh was to come
+upon them.
+
+"I'm afraid you'll both be very upset," he said at last, and again he
+had to pause.
+
+"Go on, dear," said Aunt Jane encouragingly, seeing what ah effort it
+was to him.
+
+"I am going away," he blurted out, almost like a schoolboy.  "I am going
+to South America to earn my own living," and then he buried his face on
+his arms, for he could not bear to see the distress come into their
+eyes.
+
+"Going away!"  He heard Miss Jane repeat it as if she could not believe
+her own ears; and then: "South America--going away--to South America--"
+
+Each piece of knitting went down into each lap, and two wrinkled faces
+looked at each other as if they could not understand, and then turned
+slowly to the man's bowed head--the fair head that it seemed only
+yesterday had nestled to their hearts in babyhood.
+
+"He can't mean it," breathed little Miss Mary.  "Indeed, sister, he
+can't mean it--" There was a long silence, and then with tears coursing
+silently down her cheeks Miss Jane said very quietly:
+
+"Yes, he means it, sister.  The time has come for our bird to leave the
+nest and fly away."
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY.
+
+EXPLANATIONS.
+
+"It's just this way, aunties," he explained.  "Somehow, while you and
+father made me feel you only wanted me to stay at home with you, I was
+too easy-going and happy to care about the future at all."
+
+He had come over to the fire place now and pulled a chair between them,
+so that he was quite close to each.  The ice being once broken, it was
+easier, and Miss Jane was helping him by her brave self-control.
+
+"Then, a little while ago something happened which made me suddenly
+think of what I meant to be or do in the future, and I realised how I
+was wasting the years.  Since the dear old General died, and we heard
+that Paddy and Eileen and their mother were poor, I have felt awful
+about it, as if, had I only been making the most of these years, I might
+have been able to help them now."
+
+"Poor Jack," murmured Miss Jane gently, and little Miss Mary laid her
+small withered hand upon one of his big ones.  "I am afraid it is
+chiefly our fault, sister," she said sadly.  "In our love we have been
+selfish."
+
+Miss Jane pressed her lips together tightly.  She was thinking the same
+thing, but it was hard to say it.
+
+"You will have all that we have some day, Jack," she said presently.
+"You will not be poor."
+
+"I know you will do all you can for me, aunties," he answered, "but I
+hope it will be a long, long time before anything that is your becomes
+mine."
+
+Then he told them all about his plans and about his friend, and they
+tried to listen as if they were glad for his sake, and finally arranged
+that Mr Wilkinson should be brought over to the Parsonage the following
+day, so that they might get to know him and hear all about the country
+he had come from.  It was quite late when they finally went upstairs to
+bed, and no one spoke as they kissed their usual good-night in the
+sisters' room, for their hearts were too full.  Five minutes later,
+however, there was a gentle tap upon Jack's door, and in answer to his
+voice little Miss Mary slipped into the room and softly pushed the door
+to behind her.
+
+Jack was sitting on his bed, feeling utterly wretched, and he had
+remained so since he came upstairs.  Miss Mary sat down beside him and
+slipped one arm through his.
+
+"Jack dear," she said, "you know that sister and I don't really care for
+anything in the world except you and your happiness, and that if we
+thought you were unhappy it would be impossible for us to be otherwise?"
+
+"Yes, auntie, I know," he answered, with a catch in his voice.  "You are
+just too good to me, that's all."
+
+"No, dear, because no words could ever tell all you have done for us.
+If you had not come into our lives to keep us young and hopeful, a
+sorrow that nearly broke my heart, and Jane's for my sake, would
+probably have ended in making us sour, embittered old maids."
+
+Jack shook his head; he knew how impossible that would have been.
+
+"But it might, Jack," the little lady urged; "and so we must always feel
+we cannot ever do enough for you."
+
+That Jack had had no choice in the matter of coming into their lives did
+not appear to strike her; but what of that?--she could not love him less
+or more either way.
+
+"What I want to say, Jack dear," she continued, "is that sister and I
+have often thought how foolish it was that you should have to wait until
+we are dead to have our money when we would much rather you had it now.
+As you know, we have three hundred pounds a year each, and however much
+we try we cannot spend more than fifty pounds each, living in this quiet
+country parsonage.  So we think if you would take the remaining five
+hundred pounds a year you might be able to win something of all you
+want, and we should never miss it at all."
+
+"How good you are--how good you both are," was all he could say.
+
+"And you will take it?" with unconcealed eagerness.
+
+"No, no," hastily.  "It is impossible--quite, quite impossible.  Oh,
+auntie! how could I--a great strong fellow such as I--with my health and
+strength, take away the income of two frail women?"
+
+"Jack dear," she urged tearfully, "don't look at it in that way.  It is
+only that we long to repay you for all the happiness you have brought
+into our lives."
+
+"It is impossible, auntie," he said, and his eyes glistened.
+
+"Jack,"--there was a new note of tenderness in Miss Mary's voice--"is
+there anything between you and Eileen?"
+
+For answer he dropped his face in his hands with a low groan.  For some
+moments Miss Mary was silent.  She could not trust herself to speak.
+
+"Don't think your old auntie over-curious, Jack," she said at last.  "I
+love you so.  It is just as if the pain was mine again, as it was long
+ago.  It is because I suffered so once, and understand it all, I came to
+you to-night.  Perhaps if you could tell me about it--"
+
+"You are an angel, auntie," he murmured, and gripped the little hand in
+his until he hurt it.
+
+Miss Mary waited.
+
+"She doesn't care, auntie," he said at last, as if the words were wrung
+from him.  "It just seems as if nothing in heaven or earth matters since
+Eileen does not care."
+
+"Poor boy; poor laddie," and a hot tear fell on his hand.
+
+"And I don't know why she should care," he ran on, finding relief in
+speaking.  "What have I ever done or been that she should care for me?
+I must always have seemed just a great, lazy schoolboy, and not a man at
+all.  And yet I have loved her since she was a little serious-faced
+thing in pinafores.  I can't think why I did not realise it sooner, and
+try to do something that might teach her to care.  Instead, I have just
+waited until the wolf came and stole her heart away, and found out how
+terribly I cared when the mischief was all done."
+
+"Poor laddie, poor laddie," the little lady said again, letting her
+tears flow freely.  "I don't think it was so much your fault as sister's
+and mine.  We ought to have let you go out into the world sooner.  It
+would probably have made all the difference.  Are you quite sure there
+is no hope?"
+
+"There is none now, but if he does not come back I shall still hope in
+the future.  She will not care for anyone else, I think, and by and by,
+perhaps, she will forget.  I shall go on hoping that if such a time
+comes she will turn to me."
+
+"I believe it will come, Jack," Miss Mary said hopefully, "and that in
+the end she will indeed turn to you."
+
+"But I must do something to feel more worthy of her auntie, and when I
+come back I must come with something to offer.  I feel as if I had yet
+to prove to her that I am a man," and he half smiled with a very wistful
+expression.  "She has lectured me so often on being idle and wasting my
+life; and I always meant to begin at something but somehow it got put
+off.  Perhaps it was just staying in Omeath spoilt everything.  I feel
+as if I should be different altogether when I get away from the fishing,
+and shooting, and boating, among hardworking chaps."  He paused, then
+added: "You must tell me everything about her that you possibly can, and
+perhaps--perhaps when I come back she will be waiting for me."
+
+"I believe she will, Jack, I do, indeed," and then the little lady
+kissed him lovingly and went back to tell her sister.
+
+But it was a long, weary night for all of them.  Jack's hopefulness was
+only intermittent and vanished again almost as soon as it came, leaving
+him a prey to vain, pitiless regret and longing.
+
+As for the two little ladies, it was many years since they had spent
+sadder hours.  Far into the night they wept silently, quite unable to
+comfort each other.  That he must go away was so terrible to them; that
+he must go away in trouble was only worse.  In a few weeks The Ghan
+House would be empty and their birdling flown, and the desolation in
+Omeath would be terrible beyond words.  Once before life had dealt them
+a bitter blow, and for years joy had been crushed beneath it.  Then Jack
+had come, and their old friend the General with his young wife, and life
+had smiled on them again, and it had seemed that they had found a
+"desired haven" for the remainder of their years.  And now, suddenly,
+the cup was dashed from their lips again, and the old, old bitterness
+offered, instead, and for that one night poor human nature rebelled.
+
+Only the next morning it was as if the words, "Peace be still," had been
+spoken through the silence of the starlit heavens, and two sweet, calm
+faces greeted Jack at the breakfast-table.  For sorrow does not come
+_so_ hard upon the old as upon the young, since when half the journey is
+over and can be looked back upon, for those who have eyes to see there
+is ever the God-light visible shining through the darkest hours.
+
+That day Jack told Paddy, and the news began to spread swiftly, until it
+was known in all the neighbourhood that not only was The Ghan House to
+be let to strangers, but Jack O'Hara, everybody's favourite, was going
+away across the sea to seek his fortune in foreign lands.  And in every
+direction there was manifold sorrow and regret.  People did not like to
+intrude upon Mrs Adair yet, but every day someone drove or bicycled to
+the Parsonage to know if it was indeed true, and tried the two little
+ladies sorely with their exclamations and questionings.
+
+Moreover they were extremely busy.  Going away to a foreign land--for
+all they knew, of heathens and cannibals--where there was never a woman
+to sew on a button nor darn a sock, it was, of course, necessary for
+Jack to have a regular trousseau.  Everything had to be new, everything
+of the best, and every button and every tape sewed and sewed until it
+would really have puzzled Jack to get them off if he had wanted to.
+
+In vain he expostulated and pleaded as the heap of clothes grew bigger
+and bigger.  They would not listen to him, and were deaf to his plea
+that it would necessitate chartering a private ship if he were really to
+take ill the things they were preparing for him.  When there was the
+slightest indecision about anything, it was always, "What do you think,
+sister?--will he want this?" or "Will he want a dozen suits of pyjamas"
+or "Three dozen pairs of socks?" or "Do you think he would be likely to
+require silk handkerchiefs?"  And always, whichever sister asked the
+question, the other answered gravely, "He _might_," and that was
+considered final.
+
+The Parsonage rapidly assumed the appearance of a clothing warehouse or
+permanent jumble sale, and Paddy's first real laugh broke out one
+afternoon when she came over to help sew on name-tapes.  The order for
+the socks had accidentally been repeated four times, with the result
+that they were so literally swamped in socks that it seemed quite
+impossible to get away from them go where you would.  All over the
+drawing-room socks lay everywhere.  They hid in corners of the
+dining-room, disported themselves in the kitchen, smiled at you from the
+stairs, where they had been dropped in driblets when Miss Mary carried
+one armful to the first story, to spread themselves over the bedroom.
+In many places they were hopelessly mixed up with woollen underclothes,
+which also lay broadcast around, waiting for name-tapes; while flannel
+shirts and sleeping-suits of every hue and description draped
+themselves, gracefully and otherwise, over chairs and on the dining-room
+sideboard.  The half-dozen cholera belts, that he _might_ want, managed
+even to get into the rector's study, though how or when no one knew, and
+it was only after a frantic search they were discovered.  His suits of
+clothes he had always left lying about since he left off petticoats,
+also his boots; and now, as if unwilling to see old friends outdone,
+these were tossed pell-mell among the rest, and walk where one would you
+were pretty certain to stumble over boots or get entangled in trouser
+legs.
+
+When Paddy first saw it all there was a sort of aching pause, and then
+she laughed till the tears ran down her cheeks.  Indeed, being somewhat
+out of practice, she laughed so much that she could not stop, and
+finally Jack attempted to stuff socks, and cholera belts, and woollen
+garments down her throat, to help her, while, governed by instinct, the
+two little ladies once more flew round collecting the breakables.
+
+"I'm--I'm--so afraid you won't have enough things to keep you warm,"
+gasped Paddy between her struggles.  "It's only about ninety degrees in
+the shade, you know, in South America; you really ought to have two or
+three fur coats and caps and a dozen nice warm blankets."
+
+Two minutes later nothing was to be seen of her except a pair of feet,
+emerging from a promiscuous heap of coats, waistcoats, socks, woollens,
+shirts, handkerchiefs, and an odd boot here and there.
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.
+
+TWO LOVE STORIES.
+
+Christmas Day broke clear and frosty--the last Christmas Day of the old
+order.  Everyone woke up with an oppressed feeling and a vague wish that
+for just this once the season of merry-making and gladness might have
+been omitted.  For The Ghan House and the Parsonage it had always been
+such a particularly joyous time, the aunties always spoiling the young
+folks in every possible way, and Mrs Adair had been wont to say
+laughingly when they were children, that she had to develop into a sort
+of griffin armed with salts and soothing draughts, and follow them all
+around.  And there had always been such presents too--ever since Jack,
+as a four-year-old youngster, managed to slip out of the Parsonage in
+his night-clothes and no shoes, on a cold Christmas morning, to get over
+to The Ghan House to show Paddy and Eileen his wooden horse.  The
+gardener found him trying to drag the animal over the breach in the
+wall, his poor little feet blue with cold, but his eagerness was so
+great that he could think of nothing but getting to The Ghan House with
+that precious horse before any of the Parsonage folk caught him.  So the
+gardener picked him up, horse and all, and carried him into The Ghan
+House kitchen to be warmed, and then went back to tell the aunties and
+fetch his clothes.  Meanwhile Eileen had heard him in the kitchen, and
+managed to drag herself, burdened with an enormous doll, to the head of
+the stairs, where she was only just rescued in the nick of time from
+going down head first, doll and all.
+
+But at breakfast-time things had looked a little more cheerful, for a
+delightful surprise awaited everyone.  The two families had arranged to
+spend the whole day together, and The Ghan House had been selected, so
+that quite a large party sat down to the table.  Two minutes later the
+postman arrived and Jack and Paddy once more raced and fell over each
+other to the door.  They came back with their arms loaded.  It just
+seemed as if everyone who knew them had seized the opportunity of
+expressing their sympathy by means of a little present.
+
+There were books, and handkerchiefs, and pictures, and purses--never had
+there been such a Christmas before as far as presents were concerned,
+and even Mrs Adair smiled to think her girls were so genuinely beloved.
+The greatest surprise of all came last, in the form of an envelope on
+each of the three young folk's plates.  With eager fingers Paddy got
+hers open first, and then uttered a little cry of amazement, and in two
+seconds was hugging both aunties at the same time with a vigour that
+added consternation to their discomfort.
+
+Each of the three envelopes contained a cheque for twenty pounds, and
+the three recipients could find no words to express their thanks.
+
+Later they all went to church, the Adairs sitting as usual in the top
+pew on one side of the little aisle, and the Parsonage folks in the top
+pew on the other side; just as they had sat ever since Jack and Paddy as
+children had had to be closely watched, because they would peep at each
+other and make signs behind their elders' backs.  Vivid recollections
+thronged the aunties' minds that last Christmas before the boy left
+them.  They remembered how he and Paddy would try to see who could sing
+the loudest, all out of tune of course, and had considerably disturbed
+the music of the whole congregation; how Jack, as a little chap, loved
+to slip out of the pew when his father was reading the Lessons, and
+stand beside him--and how once, when Paddy had happened to be sitting on
+the outside of the Adair's pew as a reward for being a good girl, the
+temptation had been too much for her and she had slipped after Jack; of
+the Sunday Jack had put a little frog in her pocket, and she had found
+it and screamed out in church; and of another time when Paddy,
+exasperated because he would not look at her, had deliberately, in a fit
+of naughtiness, thrown a hymn book across the aisle at his head.
+
+For one and all there were recollections that saddened and gladdened at
+once, but perhaps for Eileen were the saddest of all, because the most
+hopeless.
+
+Close behind, on one side, where his thin profile had been distinctly
+visible, was the spot where Lawrence had often sat on a Sunday evening
+after coming to church, as she could not but know, especially to see
+her.  The Blakes' parish church was at Newry, but Lawrence was never
+seen there; if he went to church at all he walked over to Omeath, and
+went in to The Ghan House to supper afterward.
+
+It was in vain Eileen told herself he was unworthy, fickle; struggle as
+she would she could not tear him out of her heart, nor forget for a
+moment all he had been to her.  The effort to do so, combined with her
+mourning for her father, and the dreariness of the future, had seriously
+affected her health the last few weeks, and just as they were finishing
+the first prayers, everyone was startled by the sound of a fall, and
+discovered Eileen in a dead faint.  A second later, with a set,
+compressed expression, Jack had picked her up as when she was a child,
+and carried her out, across the churchyard and into the Parsonage.  When
+he laid her down on the sofa, his own face was scarcely less white than
+the face on the cushions, and he smothered a sound that was almost a
+sob, as he turned away to make room for Mrs Adair and Aunt Jane.
+
+So the day ended in sadness after all, for though Eileen came round
+quickly, she was almost too weak to stand, and in the evening Jack
+helped her across to The Ghan House, and then went to fetch the doctor.
+It had been arranged for her and Paddy and their mother to start for
+London the first week in January, where Dr Adair had already taken a
+house for them, and they were to stay with him while the furniture
+followed, but in Eileen's state of health this seemed very unwise, and
+it was finally decided Jack and Paddy should start off together, and
+Mrs Adair and Eileen should move over to the Parsonage, and remain
+there for a week or two following to London when their own home was
+ready.
+
+Mrs Adair and Aunt Jane and Paddy and Jack planned it all in a
+consultation that Christmas evening, while little Miss Mary sat upstairs
+with Eileen.  It was an opportunity she had wished for some time, for
+her understanding heart saw that Eileen would be better if she could be
+induced to speak of her pain, and she believed that she held a key that
+would unlock her confidence.  She carefully closed the door and made up
+the fire, before she drew an arm-chair beside the bed, and sat down,
+saying:
+
+"I think we shall have a quiet hour now, dearie, for the others are
+talking business, and that will be so nice, won't it?"
+
+Eileen smiled her consent, and Miss Mary went on talking softly, in a
+soothing way that was natural to her.  Presently she laid a little
+wasted hand on the invalid's and said simply:
+
+"Eileen, my dear, you have always been especially precious to me.  It
+goes to my heart to feel that you are unhappy and none of us can do
+anything."
+
+The quick tears sprang to Eileen's eyes, but she made no reply.
+
+"I have been thinking, perhaps, if you could trust me--" Miss Mary
+continued a little hesitatingly.  "I know how difficult it is to speak
+of anything like this--I know how terrible it is to bear.  I once
+suffered in just the same way myself, dearie, only perhaps for me it was
+a little harder, for we were actually engaged."
+
+Eileen was crying quietly now, wholly undone by Miss Mary's tenderness,
+and made no attempt to speak.
+
+"I always meant to tell you about it some day, if you cared to hear,"
+Miss Mary went on, softly stroking the girl's hand, "and I have been
+thinking I would like to tell you now, or shall I weary you?"
+
+"No, please tell me," murmured Eileen, and her fingers closed lovingly
+over her companion's.
+
+"My dear, as you know, many people about here wonder why sister and I
+have never married, but I doubt if anyone knows the real reason except
+just she and I."  She paused a moment, and then continued simply: "You
+have heard of old General Quinn, who used to live at Omeath Park?  He
+was a hard-drinking, hard-living old man, and he had three sons, two of
+whom took after him in everything.  The third son was quieter, but he
+was terribly weak, though none of us quite knew it at the time.  He took
+after his mother, who was a beautiful Irish girl from the South, but she
+died young, and none of the boys had anyone much to look after them as
+they grew up.  There was no real harm in any of them, but the two elder
+were terribly wild, and the younger was very handsome and very fond of
+popularity, though he followed none of the excesses of his brothers.
+
+"They all three went into the army and were away some time, and then
+Patrick, the eldest, and Allan, the youngest, came home on furlough.  My
+sister and I were twenty and twenty-one then, and I believe we were
+considered very pretty, but we had never been away from the Parsonage
+much, and we knew nothing of the world beyond the mountains.
+
+"Patrick fell in love with Jane, and Allan with me, and you can
+understand, I think, how easily and naturally we were conquered, though
+sister never actually got so far as Allan and I, who were secretly
+engaged after a few weeks.  We were afraid to tell my father, because he
+was angry with the old General about something, and we knew well it was
+wiser to wait until his anger had blown over, as it always did pretty
+quickly.  The only person who knew was my godmother, and she happened to
+come and stay with us just then.  Fortunately for me she liked Allan,
+though indeed she was certain to, for he was just as handsome and
+popular as Jack, only without Jack's backbone.  She promised to help us
+if she could, and advised us not to say anything to father just yet.  Of
+Patrick and Jane she thought less, perhaps because they quarrelled so
+often, and it seemed so very doubtful if they would ever be actually
+engaged; though, when they were good friends, no one need wish to meet
+with a happier pair.  Looking back since, I have not been able to help
+feeling deeply sorry for Patrick.  Though he was wild he was not bad,
+and Jane could have done as she liked with him.  I know now that he was
+far the best of the three brothers, and it seems strange that he should
+have been the one who had to suffer for the other's sins.
+
+"Things were going on in this way when the Egyptian War broke out, and
+Allan's regiment was ordered on active service.  It was a terrible time,
+my dear.  Getting Jack's things ready now brings to my mind so clearly
+that last week with Allan, and the misery of the parting when at last he
+sailed away.
+
+"Had I known what was to follow I could not have borne it all.  My only
+fear, night and day, was that he would be killed in battle, and yet
+before so very long my cry was changed to--`Oh, God I would that he had
+been killed fighting for his country!'
+
+"We did not hear from him for some time, and then his name appeared
+among the wounded, and I was nearly distraught.  My godmother was
+staying with us again, and through her influence we managed to get many
+details we could not otherwise have done, and we heard he had been
+rather seriously hurt, and as it might prove a long case he was going to
+be taken to the hospital at Cairo.  I was not very strong at that time,
+dear, and what with worry and dread, the winter tried me exceedingly,
+and godmother grew anxious.  Then she hit upon a plan.  I must tell you
+she was rich and she had no children of her own, which doubtless made
+her care so deeply for me.  When she saw how I was suffering about
+Allan, she made up her mind to take me to him--and when she made up her
+mind about anything she always carried it through.  It took her some
+time to talk my father round, but in the end he agreed to let Jane and
+myself go away with her for three months, and a few days later we
+started for Cairo."
+
+She stopped, and remained thoughtful for a few minutes, as if recalling
+all the facts more vividly to her mind.  Eileen did not speak, and
+presently she added:
+
+"It was nine months after Allan first sailed that we reached Cairo.  It
+is no use to weary you with the details of the trip, or of what happened
+when we arrived.  All that matters is, that in three days we discovered
+he was married."
+
+"Married!" gasped Eileen incredulously.
+
+"Yes, dear, he was married to a great friend of the hospital nurse who
+had nursed him--a rich heiress."
+
+"Oh! auntie, what did you do?  How terrible for you, how terrible!"
+
+"I was very ill for some time, there at the hotel in Cairo, and my
+godmother and Jane nursed me night and day.  Afterward, as soon as I
+could be moved, they got me away to Switzerland, and there I gradually
+grew well again.  I thought it was hard at the time, Eileen, for I
+wanted so to die, but I have lived to understand how poor and weak that
+was."  She stroked the girl's hand tenderly.
+
+"It is cowardly to want to turn and run away directly the path gets hard
+and stony.  I was a coward.  I see it clearly now, and I have lived to
+feel ashamed.  I am thankful that God did not hear my passionate pleas,
+for it has comforted me often to feel I am trying to make up for the
+weakness of that terrible year.  But it was so hard at the time; oh! my
+dear, I know so well, when the future looks all black and hopeless.  But
+it is never really so.  What God takes away from us with one hand, He
+repays with the other.  I was quite certain no joy was left in all the
+world for me--nothing but a long, lonely single life.  And instead, it
+has all been so blessed and so sweet.  What I have lost in husband and
+child, I seem to have found again a thousand times in you and Paddy and
+Jack, and all the young folks and children around that I love so well.
+It has been the same with Jane, I think.  For twenty-five years--that is
+since Jack was born--we have been intensely happy in this dear, quiet
+spot.  It is hard to lose him now, and you and Paddy also, and most of
+our happiness will go with you, but we shall still have each other, and
+it is not right to repine when one is drawing near old age and the
+portals of the great New Day.  I only pray I may live to see you all
+happy, for yours is not the only aching heart, Eileen--My poor boy!" she
+added softly.
+
+"I wonder you don't feel angry with me," Eileen whispered.
+
+"My dear, how should I?--though it hurts us to know that Jack is
+unhappy, we have lived long enough to see that sorrow is a great teacher
+and a great helper, and we believe that by and by he will be glad again,
+and bless the Hand that let the sorrow come."
+
+"How good you are!"  Eileen breathed.  "It helps me only to hear you
+talk."
+
+"I want very much to help you," the little lady said sadly.  "You are
+going away to a hard change, my child, and carrying more than one heavy
+cross with you.  I wish I could bear something for you.  But you must
+try not to brood, lest it injure your health and add to your mother's
+sorrow; and you must try to be bright to help poor Paddy.  London will
+be terrible to her, poor child I fancy I see her now straining her eyes
+to the horizon, dreaming of her dear mountains and loch."
+
+There was a short silence, and she said in a changed voice:
+
+"But I have not finished my story yet.  I have not told you what
+happened to Jane and Patrick.  It was not until we came back to England,
+a year later, that I knew, and then it was a shock to me.  I am afraid I
+was very selfish all through that year, or I should have drawn it from
+Jane sooner.  It seems that Allan's conduct made her very angry with the
+whole family, and while in Cairo nursing me she learnt a great deal
+about the world generally that she had never known before.  Among other
+things she heard how wild Patrick and his brother had been, and she made
+up her mind she would have no more to do with anyone of the name of
+Quinn, for my sake.  By a strange chance, Patrick's regiment came to
+Cairo, and he sought her out at once and asked her to marry him.  A very
+stormy scene followed, in which Jane vented her wrath against Allan upon
+poor Patrick and denounced the whole family.  Then she accused him of
+drinking and betting, told him she believed no one of his name could
+keep faith, and sent him away.
+
+"Poor Patrick; poor Jane--looking back now, I believe theirs was, after
+all, the saddest case.  You see she loved him all the time, though she
+did not know how much until she had sent him away.  And he loved her,
+too.  For her sake he would have changed, and there was much good in
+him; only when she sent him away like that he just gave in and sank
+deeper, and not very long afterward he died of sunstroke in India.  For
+a long time Jane never breathed a word concerning him, and then one day
+I found her accidentally with her head down on his photograph, and I
+made her tell me all.
+
+"It was a strange mystery how one man's perfidy should be permitted to
+spoil three lives, but it is good to think that what looks so mysterious
+to our dim eyes is perfectly clear to Him, and in the end we shall
+understand and be satisfied.
+
+"That is all, dear!  Now you know why sister and I have never married,
+yet are rich because we have known the deep wonder of Love.  It is worth
+some sorrow to have that knowledge, and there is no life so barren,
+whatever else it holds, as the life that has not known a deep and true
+Love."
+
+She got up, and in the firelight it seemed to Eileen that some inner
+radiance lit up her sweet, lined face, reflecting a faint aureole round
+her silver hair.
+
+"I hear them coming upstairs.  God bless you, dear," and she stooped to
+kiss Eileen's forehead before the others stepped softly into the room.
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.
+
+GOOD-BYE.
+
+It was the early January twilight the day before they left that Jack and
+Paddy went round to take their last farewells.  They slipped out quietly
+and went alone on purpose, as neither felt particularly sure of
+themselves, and they were determined not to upset the others.  This very
+fact made Paddy remark resolutely, as they walked down to the quay:
+
+"Now, we're not going to be sentimental, Jack, and we're not going to
+act as if saying good-by was awful.  We've just got to pretend we like
+it, do you see!"
+
+"I'm with you," he answered at once, "only you'll have to show me the
+way."
+
+"Let's take hands and pretend we're children again to begin with," was
+the prompt reply, and then, hand in hand, they stood and looked across
+the water to Warrenpoint.
+
+"We've had some fun there, haven't we!" said Paddy.  "Do you remember
+the first time we crossed alone, when you were about ten and I was six,
+and what a row we got into afterward!--and three weeks later we decided
+it was worth it and went again?  Jack! what a scoundrel you were!" and
+she laughed up into his face.
+
+"I, a scoundrel indeed!  I like that!  Why, you put me up to nearly
+everything, and called me a coward if I held back."
+
+"Did I?" innocently.  "How wrong of me!  Good-by, my dear loch, we're
+only going away for a little while, and well soon be back.  Mind you
+don't forget."  And she turned briskly away, pulling Jack after her.
+
+All through the grounds of The Ghan House and the Parsonage, path by
+path, they trampled, laughing at a recollection here, an escapade there,
+each pretending not to notice how near to tears they both felt.  Last of
+all they came to the churchyard, and the hand in Jack's tightened
+involuntarily.
+
+"It will be the making of us, you know, Jack," she said, throwing back
+her head with an odd little jerk, and speaking at random.  "I can see it
+well enough now.  If you had not been suddenly awakened to the true
+state of things, you'd just have hung on here, and never been anything
+at all but two dear little old maids' spoiled darling.  By and by you
+would have taken to sipping tea, and knitting, and having your slippers
+warmed, and a hot-water bottle at nights, and grown very stout, and
+quite forgotten you were ever meant to be a man.  You'd have been for
+all the world like one of Lady Dudley's precious kittens, that are not
+allowed out in the rain for fear of getting their feet wet.  You
+wouldn't have been able to help yourself--just everything would have
+tended to it.
+
+"Oh! of course it's a splendid thing for both of us," running on.  "I'd
+have developed into an oddity of some sort, you may be sure, and been a
+kind of show person of the neighbourhood.  Or perhaps I'd never have
+grown up at all.  I'd just have remained a rowdy kid--and fancy a rowdy
+kid of thirty-five! wouldn't it be awful!  Now I'm going to be a good
+son--it sounds lovely, doesn't it?  I'm so glad daddy put it that way.
+Being a good daughter sounds namby-pamby and Sunday-schoolish, but being
+a good son, when you happen to be a girl, sounds just fine.  And then
+it's splendid not having to teach, isn't it?  Not that I could, for I
+don't know anything; but I might have had to be a nursery governess and
+worry about after tiresome children.  Mixing medicines sounds much more
+exciting, though, I think, if I might have had my choice of anything,
+I'd have been one of the keepers at the Zoo.  It would be just lovely to
+be with the animals all day long, and find out all their funny little
+ways, and make friends of them.  But best of all would have been to come
+to the Argentine with you," hurrying on without giving him time to
+speak.  "You'll ride bare-headed over endless grass plains, and have
+great times with the cattle, and shoot and fish, and have wide-spreading
+skies all around you still, while I'll be suffocated among the smuts and
+chimney-pots.  Oh, Jack, Jack!" clinging to him with sudden weakness,
+"God might have made me a man, mightn't He?  Then I could have come and
+been a cowboy with you, instead of mixing silly medicines among the
+smuts and chimney-pots."
+
+Jack put his arm round her, but for a few moments he could not trust
+himself to speak.
+
+"It'll be all right by and by, Paddy," he said at last.  "You'll get
+married, you know, to some awfully nice chap, who'll take you back to
+the country again and just spoil you all day long."
+
+She shrank away from him suddenly, almost with an angry gesture.
+
+"No, I won't get married," she said.  "I tell you I won't--I won't--I
+won't!"
+
+Jack looked taken aback.
+
+"Why ever not!" he asked.
+
+"Because I won't, that's why.  You're no better than the other men,
+Jack--and you're all a lot of blind owls.  You think a girl can't do
+without getting married--that just that, and nothing else, is her idea
+of happiness!  Such rubbish--you ought to have more sense."
+
+Jack was quite at a loss to understand in what way he had so
+unexpectedly offended, and for the matter of that Paddy was not much
+wiser but under her show of determination and spirit her heart was just
+breaking, and she felt she must go to one extreme or another to keep up
+at all.  And then that he could talk so calmly of her getting married
+and belonging to someone else?  Was it possible he would not care the
+least little bit if his old playfellow could be the same to him no
+longer?  Did his love for Eileen make her no more of any account at all?
+Of course it was so--she could see it plainly now; he did not really
+mind leaving anything or anybody except Eileen; the rest of them were
+all in a bunch--just people he had been fond of once.  Her goaded heart
+ran on, exaggerating every little detail in its misery, and adding
+tenfold to its own loneliness; while in every thought she wronged Jack.
+
+Before all things he was intensely affectionate and true; and so deep
+was his distress at leaving his aunts and the old home and each inmate
+of The Ghan House, that he had given less thought to Eileen than usual,
+as the day of departure approached.
+
+"What have I done, Paddy?" he said, seeing the wild, strained look in
+her eyes.
+
+"Go away," she said.  "Go away to Eileen, and leave me with daddy."
+
+The tears rained down her cheeks, as she turned from him to her father's
+grave, and leaning against a tombstone behind it buried her face in her
+hands, murmuring passionately:
+
+"Why did you go away, daddy, when I wanted you so?  Didn't you know I
+hadn't anyone else?--that I'd be just all alone?  Mother loves Eileen
+best, and Jack and the aunties love her best, but you and I belonged to
+each other, and we didn't mind.  It wasn't kind to go away and leave me.
+It wasn't good of God--it was cruel.  I'll be a good son, because I
+promised, but I'd much rather come to you, and no one would mind.
+Daddy, daddy, can't you hear me?  Ah!  I know you can't or you'd come to
+me.  You couldn't stay in Heaven or anywhere else if you knew your Paddy
+had this awful--awful lonely feeling--you'd just make God let you come
+back to me.  Only you can't hear, you can't hear, and I'm all alone--
+alone.  What shall I do through all the long years to come?"
+
+She was now in a paroxysm of weeping, all the more intense that she had
+kept up so long, and Jack was frightened.  His impulse was to run and
+fetch one of the aunts, but something held him back.  Instinct told him
+that there was in Paddy a kindred soul, which would shrink from letting
+anyone see her in tears if she could possibly help it.  So he stood and
+waited beside her silently, as he would have wished her to do had he
+been in her place.  And when Paddy grew quieter, this action in itself
+appealed to her more than anything else could have done, and all her
+anger against him died away.
+
+"I'm awfully silly, Jack.  I don't know what you'll think of me," she
+said, trying to stay the tears.
+
+"I think you're rather unkind," he answered.
+
+She seemed surprised and asked "Why?"
+
+"You know I think the world of you," he blurted out, feeling very near
+tears himself.  "You know you're just the best pal a chap ever had."
+
+Paddy gave a little crooked smile.
+
+"Then you ought not to want me to get married," she said.
+
+"You know I only want you to have a good time, and that I'd rather a
+thousand time you were a man and could come with me to the Argentine."
+
+Paddy slipped her arm through his and rubbed her face against his
+coat-sleeve caressingly.  "I know you would, Jack.  I'm just horrid, but
+you must forget and make allowances.  I feel--oh, I don't know what I
+feel--it's so positively awful."
+
+"I know," he said feelingly.  "That's just it, positively awful.  But
+it's not any good minding, so we'd better go on trying to pretend we
+don't.  I'll be glad when we're started now.  I dread to-morrow so."
+
+The next evening they stood together leaning on the ship rail, and
+straining their eyes up the loch while they steamed away from Greenore.
+The terrible day was over at last, and both felt quite exhausted.  "How
+had they ever kept up at all?" they wondered, through those three meals
+of forced conversations, forced smiles, and poor attempts at merriment.
+How had the aunties ever kept up?  Of a certainty they were sobbing
+their hearts out now in the empty, empty Parsonage.  There had been no
+tears until the final good-by and then the strain had become too much
+for them.  But Jack had still held on manfully.
+
+"Don't you fret, aunties," he said, with an odd little crack in his
+voice.  "I'll be back almost before you've had time to tidy up after me,
+with pockets full of gold; and Paddy and I will be flying over the
+furniture again, and you'll both be collecting the ornaments, and you'll
+just forget we've ever been away at all."
+
+"That's if I don't poison somebody and get hanged meanwhile," said Paddy
+in a cheerful way that made them all laugh in spite of themselves.  "I'm
+sure I'll never know one medicine from another."
+
+And now the ship is steaming away, and the two travellers strain their
+eyes to the familiar mountains, outlined distinctly against the
+star-spangled sky in the bright moonlight.
+
+"I'm glad we can see the old giant on Carlingford Mountain," Paddy said.
+"I've always had a kind of fondness for him.  He lies there so calmly
+through all weathers, and when it's bright and sunny and not too hot I
+can always imagine him heaving a sigh of content that it's not raining,
+or snowing, or anything unpleasant.  Good-by, old man," waving her hand
+to him.  "I'll be back again soon, and mind you don't change in any way.
+I want you to look exactly the same when I come again.
+
+"There are the lights at Warrenpoint," she ran on.  "Isn't it odd to
+think that the people there are going about just as usual; and next
+summer the Pierrots will come again, and we shall all be so far away?
+The mountains look specially beautiful to-night, don't they?  My dear
+Mourne Mountains, it's just as if they put on their very best dresses,
+to look their nicest for our sake.  I'm quite sure they're sorry, Jack.
+They're just awfully sorry, but they can't say it.  You see they've
+watched us grow up, and we must have amused them a good deal at times.
+They know all about that first rabbit we shot, when we stole daddy's
+gun.  How proud we were, weren't we?  And they were so angry at home,
+instead of delighted as we thought they ought to be, when we carried in
+the trophies of our big game expedition.  You were Selous, you know, and
+I was Captain Bailey.  We had been reading about them just before.  I
+expect they know about every time we have got capsized in the loch, and
+each time we were lost and nearly got in bogs, and just all about
+everything.  Good-by again!" and she waved her handkerchief slowly.  A
+bitter sea wind struck them.
+
+"You'll catch cold," said Jack.  "Come in."
+
+"All right," and she turned away.  At the entrance to the salon she
+looked back once more.  "Good-by," she said softly to the night.
+"Good-by, daddy's grave--try and keep nice.  Daddy himself will be in
+London with me."
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.
+
+GWENDOLINE CAREW.
+
+Lawrence Blake found Calcutta even more to his liking than he expected.
+When he left England what conscience he possessed pricked him rather
+severely, but when he reached India he was able to plunge into a round
+of gaieties that left him little enough time to think.  Still, whenever
+he remembered Eileen he felt the same twinge.  He recognised that she
+was not quite like other girls.  She had not in any way laid herself
+open to the blow he had dealt her, and she had certainly not led him on.
+All through she had been just her own natural self, and he could not
+but know this only placed his conduct in a still less pleasant light.
+It would have been nothing to be proud of with any girl, but it does
+sometimes happen that a man is not wholly to blame when he has gone
+further than he meant.
+
+At the same time Lawrence was a little surprised.  He had several times
+paid quite as much and even more attention to members of the fair sex
+without meaning it, and gone quietly away, but he never before
+remembered experiencing the unpleasant sensation that he had acted like
+a cad.  Did he then care more than he supposed? he asked once or twice.
+No, this was not the solution, for if anything, he felt relief as the
+distance between them lengthened.  It was then, perhaps, the fearless
+measure of scorn that Paddy had dealt out to him, forcing him to see
+himself as he looked in the eyes of anyone who loved truth and
+sincerity.  This, and the growing consciousness of how infinitely above
+him in all that matters most, was the girl whose heart he had carelessly
+trifled with.
+
+The passengers on that particular P. and O. steamboat bound for India
+found Lawrence taciturn and morose to a degree, and in the end left him
+severely alone.  When he arrived in Calcutta he revived, for there was
+so much to distract his attention.  Gwendoline was charming.  Earl
+Selloyd's attentions were more pronounced than ever, and playing at
+rivals amused him.  And there was no risk of any serious harm this time
+either, for Gwen was a wholly different type of girl from Eileen, and
+perfectly well able to take care of herself.  She liked queening it over
+him, and he was useful to her, and for the rest she was more likely to
+trifle with him, than give him a chance to trifle with her.
+
+They saw a great deal of each other because Lawrence was a great friend
+of both her father's and mother's, and their doors were always open to
+him.  So, while living at his club in Calcutta, he spent a part of each
+day with the Carews, either lounging in the morning-room in the morning,
+or dining with them in the evening, or accompanying them to some of the
+endless social festivities they attended.
+
+People soon began to talk, and generally designated him the Earl's chief
+rival, but neither Gwendoline nor Lawrence paid any attention, only
+amusing themselves with the Earl's discomfiture.  Mrs Carew was rather
+set upon the coronet, however, and endeavoured to enlist Lawrence upon
+her side.  The topic was brought up in the drawing-room one afternoon
+about a month after he arrived, and just in the middle of it Gwen
+herself burst into the room.
+
+"He is an extremely nice man, and it is such an excellent position," her
+mother was saying, and then, she stopped short to find her daughter
+standing before her with laughter in her splendid dark eyes.
+
+"So mamma is making a countess of me off-hand, is she?" she asked,
+turning to Lawrence, who was looking on with an amused smile from the
+depths of a big easy-chair.
+
+"We were just considering how a coronet would become you," he replied.
+
+"Oh! the coronet's all right," shrugging her shoulders, "but the man!
+Heaven preserve me from marrying a woolly lamb with a spring inside,
+that says `Baa-a-a' when you squeeze it."
+
+"I didn't think you had got so far as that," said Lawrence wickedly.
+
+"Don't try to be funny," retorted Gwen; "it doesn't suit your peculiar
+style of cleverness.  Look here, mother," turning to Mrs Carew again
+with the air of a young queen, "don't you go setting your heart on
+Selloyd for a son-in-law, because I won't have him.  I won't have
+anybody yet.  I'm having a glorious time, and I mean to keep on.  It's
+all rot wanting to tie a girl up her first season.  I mean to have three
+seasons, and then, if no one else will have me, I'll take Lawrence," and
+she flashed a bewitching glance at him.
+
+"Lawrence won't want a wife who's been in the lists three seasons," said
+her mother.
+
+"Lawrence will do as he's told," promptly.  "It will be a new
+experience, and very good for him."
+
+"And afterward I suppose you'll allow me the same beneficial course with
+you," he remarked.
+
+"Oh, no," laughing.  "Women who are reigning types of English beauty
+never have to do as they are told.  They simply reign."
+
+"All the same I'm afraid Lawrence would know you far too well to put his
+head in such a noose," said Mrs Carew.  "If any man would let you do as
+you liked, Selloyd would, and they say he is fabulously rich."
+
+"I don't care.  He can keep his old riches and his old title: I tell you
+I'm having a good time, and I don't mean to change it.  With half
+Calcutta at your feet abroad, and Lawrence at your feet at home, what
+could I possibly want more?"
+
+"You will wake up one day and find Lawrence gone, and the others rapidly
+getting tired of stooping."
+
+"I don't care--and Lawrence would have to come back."
+
+"That wouldn't be much good if he were married."
+
+"Married!--Lawrence married!" and a ringing laugh sounded through the
+room.  "Why, he'd never have the energy to propose, much less be
+bothered to get fixed up.  He'll just lounge about in easy-chairs all
+his life, smiling his cynical old smile, and rousing himself
+occasionally to make cutting speeches.  The only way to marry Lawrence
+would be to propose yourself, and arrange everything, because he'd give
+in rather than have the bother of refusing.  That's how it will probably
+end, and I shall take pity on him and be the victim.  I shall say, `Wake
+up, Lawrie, you've got to marry me,' and I shall have the licence all
+ready and drag him off then and there."
+
+"Who did you say would be the victim!" he asked.
+
+The butler entered with a letter, and, after hastily reading it, Mrs
+Carew explained that she must send an answer that evening, and excusing
+herself to Lawrence went out, leaving the young folks alone.  Gwendoline
+seated herself on the arm of a chair near him and commenced a running
+conversation.
+
+"How did you like that photograph I sent you?" she asked presently.  "I
+don't believe you ever had the manners to write and thank me."
+
+"If I didn't it was because I knew I should be seeing you so soon."
+
+"Well, how did you like it?  You don't seem inclined to go into raptures
+over it, as you ought."
+
+"All the same, I thought it excellent."
+
+"What did you do with yourself in that deadly little Irish hamlet?
+Wasn't it perfectly awful?  Why didn't you come away sooner?"
+
+"I rather enjoyed it than otherwise."
+
+"Oh! you rather enjoyed it, did you?" pricking up her ears.  "I thought
+you never could be bothered to enjoy anything."
+
+"I can't say I put myself out much over this."
+
+"Are there any nice girls there?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Many?"
+
+"Two."
+
+"So ho!" impressively.  "Yet I didn't think country bumpkins were much
+in your line."
+
+"One of them is as good-looking as you."
+
+"Is she dark?" with a little pout.
+
+"No, fair."
+
+"Umph--Insipid?"
+
+"No, good."
+
+"Good!" she echoed in a tone of laughing derision.  "How amusing!  Have
+you really been able to find entertainment in a goody-goody girl?"
+
+"I didn't say `goody-goody.'"
+
+"Well, you implied it, and that's the same thing."
+
+"Not in this case."
+
+"And I say it is.  We'll change the subject.  Goody-goody girls don't
+interest me in the least.  What's the other like?"
+
+"Like you."
+
+"Like me!"--in surprise.  "Then she's pretty, too?"
+
+"No.  On the whole she is plain."
+
+"You wretch!  I protest she is not in the least like me!"
+
+"And I tell you she is."
+
+"But how?"
+
+"In manner and ways."
+
+"My dear Lawrence, you are talking nonsense.  Do you mean to tell me
+that after my Parisian education, and presentation in London, and year
+of travel, and the gayeties of India, I resemble a little, countrified
+Irish girl?"
+
+"I said that she resembled you, which is quite a different thing."
+
+"Well, go on."
+
+"She is quite your equal at repartee.  She has quite your number of
+admirers, though they may not be of the same social position, and she
+treats them with precisely the same disdain."
+
+"I hate her," said Gwendoline pettishly.
+
+"That is exactly what she said about you."
+
+Gwen sprang up.  "Oh, she did, did she!" she exclaimed, "and pray why!"
+
+"I don't know."
+
+"Yes you do.  Don't try and back out of it now, after telling me that
+much.  What have you been saying to her about me!"
+
+"I haven't been saying anything."
+
+Gwen clenched her hand and bit her teeth together.
+
+"In two minutes I shall shake you.  There is nothing either funny or
+clever in being exasperating."
+
+"I am sorry," he replied, with imperturbable humour.  "If you will tell
+me what you want to know, I will try to enlighten you."
+
+"Then `why' and `when' did this country bumpkin say she hated me!"
+
+"The incident took place in a sanctum at Mourne Lodge, known as my den,
+upon the evening when Kathleen and Doreen `came out.'"
+
+"And what was she doing in your den, pray, in the middle of a dance!"
+
+Gwen spoke peremptorily.  She had somehow, unconsciously, grown to
+consider Lawrence her property, although there had never been anything
+but good-fellowship between them.  Ever since she was ten and he was
+twenty she had ordered him about, and Lawrence, while teasing her, had
+usually acquiesced because she amused him.
+
+"To the best of my recollection she was playing with my foreign swords."
+
+"And how could that have anything to do with me?"
+
+"She chanced to weary of the swords, and on a voyage of further
+discovery came across your photograph, in the place of honour, on my
+desk."
+
+A pleased gleam passed through her eyes.
+
+"Ah!" she said, "and she was angry because she is in love with you."
+
+"On the contrary, she hates me even more than you."
+
+Owen frowned and looked incredulous.
+
+"Now you are talking riddles again--how silly you are!  If she hates
+you, why did she go into your den, and why was she angry with me?  I
+believe you are making the whole thing up."
+
+"I am not.  I do not think she spoke half a dozen civil words to me
+after the dance, and when I came away she would not shake hands.  She
+told me she much preferred my room to my company."
+
+"Really?" with dawning interest.
+
+"Really," emphatically.
+
+"Well, she's rather interesting after all," said Gwen, "for no doubt you
+are the eligible man of the neighbourhood."
+
+"She wouldn't care a snap of the fingers for that."
+
+"Not any more than I do for the woolly lamb's coronet?"
+
+"Exactly.  Now you are getting at the resemblance."
+
+"But you haven't yet told me why she hates you and me."
+
+He shrugged his shoulders.  "I'm not very clear," he answered, "and
+anyhow it would be too tedious to try and explain.  It's a trifle enough
+anyway.  Hullo!" breaking off, "isn't that your baa-lamb I hear?"
+
+Gwen listened with her head on one side.
+
+"Yes, that's his bleat," she said.  "Mamma will lead him in by a blue
+ribbon, so to speak, in a minute, and I shall want desperately to
+recite:
+
+  "`Mummie had a woolly lamb,
+  Its fleece was white as snow,
+  But 'twas everywhere that Gwennie went
+  That lamb would always go.'"
+
+She jumped up and commenced patting her hair into place and
+straightening the lace of her dress, remarking that, after all said and
+done, there was no harm in captivating.  A moment later her mother came
+in looking worried.
+
+"My dear," she said, "Earl Selloyd wishes to speak to you alone.  He is
+in the library."
+
+"Good Heaven!" exclaimed Gwen.  "Has it come to this!"
+
+"It's very wrong to speak of it in that way," said her mother
+reprovingly.  "I'm sure I don't know where the girls of the present day
+get their queer manners from.  Do try and realise that Earl Selloyd has
+come here this afternoon to pay you the greatest honour it is in the
+power of any man to pay to any woman."
+
+"Baa--a--a--a," mimicked Gwen wickedly, and Lawrence bit his lip.
+
+"At least then, remember that you are a gentlewoman," continued Mrs
+Carew severely, "or that Providence intended you for one."
+
+"Now you're getting sarcastic, mummie."  Gwen went up and put her arm
+round her mother's neck.  "Don't you get sarcastic with Gwennie, mummie,
+because she's just all right underneath.  It's only on the top die's
+queer.  Because you thought you were going to rear a stately swan, and
+found you had only a wicked duckling, you needn't frown and pucker up in
+that fashion.  Stately swans are very tedious, and wicked ducklings do
+at least keep you going; so you ought really to go down on your knees
+and thank the good Providence that spared you the monotony of
+perpetually sailing about with your neck at an uncomfortable angle.
+Don't you think so, Lawrie?  Now, I'll go and see his Earlship and be
+good.  To him I shall put the case differently, and explain how
+infinitely preferable the calm of the stately swan is, beside the
+tiresome duckling,"--and she crossed the large drawing-room to the door.
+Here, however, she turned again.
+
+"Lawrie."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Do you know, I've an odd notion that if you haven't already fallen in
+love with that Irish, country-bumpkin girl, you very shortly will!" and
+without giving him time to reply she vanished.
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR.
+
+LAWRENCE HEARS SOME NEWS.
+
+"Now, you know this is very foolish," said Gwen.
+
+When she entered the library Earl Selloyd had hastened to meet her with
+exaggerated courtesy, and dragged forward a big arm-chair, begging her
+to be seated.  Gwen poised herself on the arm of it, and swung one foot.
+
+"Very foolish, indeed!" she repeated, eyeing gravely the thin, nervous,
+foolish-looking young man, who, nevertheless, represented one of the
+oldest and most illustrious families of England.
+
+"I hope you don't mean that," he said.  "Indeed, Miss Carew, it is only
+your happiness I have at heart."
+
+"And a little your own, I hope," with a faint smile.  Then she went on
+before he could interrupt: "You know I have the name for being very
+original, Lord Selloyd, and I'm going to be original now.  You've
+evidently come here this evening to propose to me, and I'm not going to
+let you propose.  I'm not the sort of girl who likes to count up her
+conquests and tell all the other girls.  All I ask of things generally
+just now is, let me have a good time, and I don't care whether I get any
+proposal or not.  Of course I think it is awfully good of you to want to
+give me your name and title and all that, but since I can't accept them,
+we won't say any more about it."
+
+"But my dear Miss Carew," he implored, "your mother led me to suppose
+that she--"
+
+"That doesn't count," interrupted Gwen.  "To be very candid, you know as
+well as I do that no mother can help fancying a coronet for her
+daughter, and it's just the same the world over.  Now, although I'm
+supposed to be very up to date, I'm really positively antique about some
+things, and one of them is the question of matrimony.  I'm so
+old-fashioned that I mean to marry for love, even if I marry a plain Mr
+Nobody.  There! now you must see that it is a mistake to continue this
+interview."
+
+His lordship fidgeted nervously.  "But couldn't you?" he
+began--"couldn't you--don't you think--?"
+
+"I'm afraid not," Gwen said kindly, helping him out.  "Isn't there
+anything I could do?" pleadingly.  "Perhaps if you would tell me what
+you want in a man--?"
+
+Gwen felt inclined to say it was a _man_, just that, pure and simple:
+that she wanted, but she was naturally a kind hearted girl and had no
+desire to hurt his feelings.
+
+"It's no use," she said frankly.  "Let's part friends, and you'll soon
+find someone you can care for heaps more than me, who won't worry the
+life out of you a bit like I should have done."
+
+His lordship shook his head sorrowfully, and looked very woebegone.
+
+"No," he said, "I shall never love another, and I shall never be happy
+again.  I might as well go and shoot myself at once."
+
+Gwen felt desperately inclined to laugh, but managed to keep her face
+sufficiently to say:
+
+"Oh no, I wouldn't do that.  When you've got a fine estate, and a title,
+and all that sort of thing, it's a pity to clear out and let someone
+else snatch it up."
+
+His lordship seemed rather struck with the idea, for he said no more
+about shooting as he dragged himself to the door.  He did, however,
+contrive to look the picture of wretchedness, though somehow not in a
+manner that appealed to Gwen's heart, and when the door finally closed
+behind him she hid her face in her hands a moment as if she would hide
+her smile even from herself.  She had to pause to straighten her face
+again before she reappeared in the drawing-room, though Lawrence read
+everything directly in her eyes.
+
+"Well," said her mother, "have you sent him away?"
+
+"I didn't send him, mummie--he went," she answered coaxingly.
+
+"He wouldn't have gone if you had answered him sensibly."
+
+"Answered him about what?"
+
+"Why, his proposal, of course."
+
+"But he didn't propose."
+
+"Didn't propose!" dropping her work on her knee, and lifting her eyes in
+astonishment.
+
+"No, mummie.  I advised him not to."
+
+Lawrence's rare smile spread over his face.
+
+"My dear, what do you mean?" said Mrs Carew with a helpless look.
+
+"Well, mother, what was the good of Lord Selloyd making a fool of
+himself any more than he could help by asking me to marry him, when I
+was certain to decline with thanks?  I didn't put it to him quite like
+that, but it came to the same thing in the end, and he had the sense to
+see it and go away."
+
+"You are hopeless, quite hopeless; and I believe you make her worse,
+Lawrence."
+
+"No, indeed," answered Lawrence from the depths of his easy-chair.  "I
+have been at great pains to point out to her the ineffable benefits of a
+coronet, to say nothing of a husband who is--well--like cotton-wool in
+the hands of a strong-minded woman."
+
+"You are both leagued against me," continued the mother, shaking her
+head.  "If the same thing happens again, Lawrence, I shall just expect
+you to marry her yourself, and what will happen to your quiet Irish home
+then I'm afraid to think."  She spread out her hands with a gesture of
+hopelessness, but there was a twinkle in her eyes that made the mother
+and daughter for a moment wonderfully alike.  "Gwen buried in the Mourne
+Mountains would result in a social tornado, and a year of libel actions.
+She'd just scandalise the whole countryside and set every one
+quarrelling to break the monotony, and though you think you are very
+strong-minded, Lawrence, you'd find your match in Gwen; and I ought to
+know, being her mother."
+
+Owen laughed gayly, without the smallest shadow of self-consciousness,
+for marriage between herself and Lawrence had been so long talked of
+with jesting freedom that it embarrassed neither of them in the smallest
+degree, although there were many who firmly believed it would eventually
+ensue.
+
+"We'd get mummie to come and smooth things over, wouldn't we?" she
+laughed, and sauntered to the piano, afterward singing several songs in
+a rich and beautiful contralto.  When she was tired of singing she came
+back to the fireplace and, seating herself upon a low footstool,
+remarked to her mother with a side-glance at Lawrence: "Has Lawrie told
+you about his Irish friend yet, mummie?"
+
+"No," looking up questioningly.  "Hasn't he?" in feigned surprise.  "I
+am astounded.  He's just full of her."
+
+"Her?" repeated Mrs Carew, raising her eyebrows significantly.
+
+"Yes, _her_--and she _hates_ me, mummie.  What do you think of that?"
+
+"But surely she doesn't know you?"
+
+"That's of no account at all.  She's rather given to hating, for she
+hates Lawrie too--at least she says she does."
+
+"I hardly see how she can be his friend then."
+
+"Oh, yes! it's simple enough.  If I say I hate a man, I find it's
+generally a sure sign I rather like him.  Only I'm surprised she's found
+the trick out, buried among those old mountains."
+
+"All the mountain ranges in the world piled up round a woman wouldn't
+make her other than contrary," remarked Lawrence.  "I can imagine her
+wrestling and struggling to get away, and then a deliverer of the male
+sex comes along and proceeds to help her, says something she doesn't
+like, or doesn't say something she does like, and she would promptly sit
+down and say she adored mountain ranges and wouldn't be in any other
+spot for the world."
+
+"Of course," exclaimed Gwen, "you wouldn't have us grow as milk and
+watery and monotonous as the male sex, would you?  That's just what
+makes us so interesting."
+
+"Irritating would be nearer the mark."
+
+"Well, both if you like.  One is just as good for you as the other.  But
+touching this Irish girl, what's her name, Lawrie?"
+
+"There were two I told you of.  Which do you mean?"
+
+"Why, the one who hates, of course.  The other doesn't count, especially
+if she's goody-goody."
+
+"The hater is Paddy Adair."
+
+"Paddy!" cried Gwen in amusement.  "What a name, but I rather like it!
+I'm beginning to feel quite interested in this Paddy.  At first I was
+furious with her for daring to hate me, but now I rather like her for
+it.  Tell me something about her."
+
+"There isn't anything to tell."
+
+"Of course there is.  What does she do all day long, living in that
+deadly place!"
+
+"Fishes, and shoots, and sails."
+
+"Oh, does she shoot!" with eagerness.
+
+"She's the finest shot of her sex that I've ever come across, and she
+can sail a boat as well as any man.  She gets capsized into the loch
+periodically, but thinks nothing of it.  Her father is a soldier, and
+the wilder the things she does, the better he likes it, because then he
+is half able to persuade himself that she is a boy.  I believe the dream
+of his life was to have a son, but as it is he considers Paddy the next
+best thing and dotes on her."
+
+"She must be very jolly," said Gwen.  "What a pity she isn't pretty
+too."
+
+"I never knew anyone who cared less.  She won't even take the trouble to
+make the most of her hair, and yet, with a little pains, it is so
+beautiful that she could easily pass for a good-looking girl."
+
+"I'd like to know her," said Gwen.
+
+"I daresay you will when you find there's nothing for it but to take me
+and reign at Mourne Lodge instead of Selloyd Castle," with a twinkle.
+
+"I wonder if she'd still hate me," thoughtfully.
+
+Lawrence said nothing, but he was of the opinion that Paddy would hate
+more than ever.
+
+Owen's father came in then from an official interview with Lord
+Kitchener, during which grave matters concerning the welfare of India
+had been discussed.  The Hon.  Jack Carew, as he still continued to be
+called, in spite of his forty-three years, held a Government post in
+India, and was one of the popular rising men of his day, great things
+being predicted for him in the future.  Like all the rest, he idolised
+Gwen, and when told of the Earl's visit and its result he took her side
+entirely, secretly only too glad to feel the question of a wedding once
+more thrust in the background.  The subject was quickly dismissed, and
+affairs of state, as far as was permissible, discussed with great
+interest between the father and daughter and Lawrence, until the latter
+departed for his club.
+
+Here he was surprised to find a letter with a thin black edge awaiting
+him, in his mother's handwriting, and, once more sinking into the depths
+of a big easy-chair, he proceeded to read it.  As he did so his brow
+contracted somewhat, and once or twice he glanced over the top of the
+paper with a half-anxious, worried expression.  Then he folded it up
+slowly, and sat for a long time lost in thought.
+
+So the General was dead--the kind old soldier he could remember almost
+as soon as he could remember anything--and, beyond doubt, Omeath and its
+neighbourhood was greatly the poorer.  And The Ghan House was to be let,
+was probably already let, and Mrs Adair and her daughters were going to
+London.  This was the news that set him thinking the most deeply--at
+first it seemed so utterly incredible.  Omeath without the Adairs was
+like a problem he could not solve.  Omeath without Jack O'Hara--without
+the Adairs or Jack--was only more extraordinary still.
+
+And then to go to London!  Eileen and Paddy cooped up in a little stuffy
+London house, after their lovely home among the mountains on the
+loch-side.  It was not possible--surely it was not possible that this
+had to be.
+
+He read the letter again, lingering over the part that explained how all
+the General's private means had gone and there was nothing left but the
+widow's pension, and how the post of dispenser had been offered to
+Paddy, and rather than be separated they were all going to London
+together.
+
+So Paddy was to be dispenser?  What in the name of fortune could have
+put such an idea into their heads?  Paddy dispensing was so ludicrous to
+him that he could scarcely forbear to smile.  But he soon grew serious
+again.  The Adairs' misfortunes touched him more nearly than he would
+have thought.  His mind ran on.  If he went back and persuaded Eileen to
+marry him, he wondered if there would be any difficulty about his
+renting The Ghan House, and installing Mrs Adair and Paddy there for
+good.  He believed not.  If it were arranged that the gift came from
+Eileen, they could hardly object, and, for the matter of that, why
+should they?
+
+Far into the night Lawrence sat in his big easy-chair, oblivious to all
+that was going on around him, thinking out his new idea.
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE.
+
+A CURIOUS ENGAGEMENT.
+
+For several days Lawrence had only a flying interview with Gwen, so
+occupied was she with balls and receptions and gayeties of all kinds,
+and meanwhile he still pondered the question of the Adairs.  At last
+Gwen noticed he was unusually quiet, and taxed him in her customary
+outspoken fashion.
+
+"There's something the matter with you, Lawrie," she said.  "You've been
+looking as solemn as a boiled owl for days.  Is it an attack of liver,
+or the hundred-and-ninety-ninth love episode?  Come, out with it, and
+let me give you the benefit of my sage advice."
+
+They were standing on the large staircase at the Viceroy's, having met
+at a reception there, and she had detained him in passing.
+
+"Why not choose a more public spot?"  Lawrence asked.  "Only half
+Calcutta would hear us here, and they might as well all know."
+
+"You goose," she laughed.  "I suppose you want a _tete-a-tete_.  Oh,
+dear!" with a sigh; "and I've got such a lot of special friends here
+to-night.  Never mind, I'll manage it.  I'll go with you to have
+refreshments at eleven o'clock, and then we'll--well, we'll go and look
+at the idols and mummies and things," and she passed gayly on.
+
+Later they found their way into a quiet alcove that overlooked the big
+reception rooms, and Gwen at once plunged into the subject.
+
+"Is it anything to do with the little Irish girl?" she asked.
+
+"Partly."
+
+"Well, what's happened."
+
+"Her father is dead."
+
+"Dead!" echoed Gwen, in a shocked voice.
+
+"Yes.  He died after a few days' illness, about six weeks ago, of some
+heart attack."
+
+"Goodness!  How sudden it seems.  When did you hear?"
+
+"The night I told you about them."
+
+"Fancy!  And I've never given you a chance to speak of it."
+
+Lawrence was silent.
+
+"I can see that's not all," she said.
+
+"No.  The money all seems to have gone, and they have to leave their
+home and go and live in London, and Paddy's going to be a dispenser."
+
+"What in the name of wonder is a dispenser?"
+
+"A person who makes up prescriptions."
+
+"In a chemist's shop!" opening her eyes wide.
+
+"Sometimes; but in this case it would be in a private doctor's surgery."
+
+"What an extraordinary occupation!  What on earth put it into their
+heads!  If I had to earn money I'd go into a big establishment where you
+did nothing all day long except try on lovely dresses and pat yourself
+on the back because you knew you looked infinitely better in them than
+the annoying people who had the money to buy them."
+
+"That wouldn't suit Paddy.  She'd probably end by throwing the dresses
+at the people's heads.  It's quite likely that's what she'll eventually
+do with the bottles of medicine."
+
+"Poor Paddy," said Gwen softly.  "Do you know, I don't hate her a bit
+now!  I'm just awfully sorry."
+
+Lawrence was silent a moment.
+
+"It will be terrible for those girls to have to live in London," he said
+at last.
+
+"What--are they sisters?" she cried.  "Do you mean Paddy and the
+goody-goody girl?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"But you didn't say they were sisters before."
+
+"Didn't I?" carelessly.  "Well, probably I didn't think about it."
+
+Gwen watched him thoughtfully.
+
+"Do you know," she said at last, "I think you'll just have to go home
+and marry Paddy, and make the mother and the other one a present of
+their old home."
+
+"Paddy would almost as soon marry the Sultan of Turkey."
+
+Gwen looked at him with a sudden light of understanding.
+
+"Lawrie," she exclaimed, "you don't mean to tell me that you've been
+foolish enough to make love to the goody-goody one!"
+
+"I told you she was not goody-goody," shortly.
+
+"Well, what is she, then!"
+
+There was a pause.
+
+"She's like my mother," he said slowly; "only mother was never as
+good-looking."
+
+"Yes, that's all very well," quoth Gwen; "but men never want to marry
+their mothers, even when they worship them.  I can just see the whole
+thing now, and you've behaved like an idiot, for all your brains and
+cleverness.  If I had been there to look after you it wouldn't have
+happened.  A man of your type does not _love_ a girl of her type; he
+only admires and respects from a distance.  If you had married her you
+wouldn't have made her happy, so it's a very good thing for her you've
+come away.  Why! your morose, taciturn moods would have broken her
+heart, and your temper would have been like an icy blast to a delicate
+hot-house flower.  She would never have understood you at all; and being
+sweet-tempered and unselfish herself would only have left her more
+hopelessly in the dark, and in the end have irritated you awfully.  Oh!
+I am very wise, Lawrie, about some things.  I don't know how I got it,
+but it's there, and possibly father spared me a biggish slice of his
+brains.  Now the other girl, Paddy, would suit you well, but it's a pity
+she's plain.  If you were moody and sullen with her I expect she'd throw
+something at your head, and that's just about what you need."
+
+"You are very kind."
+
+"Glad you think so," with a little laugh; "but meanwhile, what's to be
+done with your friends!"
+
+Lawrence was annoyed with her plain speaking, probably because she was
+so distinctly in the right.
+
+"I think," he said coolly, "that I shall return to England and marry
+Paddy's sister."
+
+Gwen looked into his face, and saw with her usual intuition exactly how
+matters stood.
+
+"Very well," she said airily, getting up.  "Go and make the funeral pile
+of your own happiness and hers as well.  I'm sure I don't care, and I've
+got quite as much on my hands out here just now as I can well attend to,
+so I'll be quite relieved to leave you to look after your own affairs
+entirely.  But when you've managed to fit a square block into a round
+hole by becoming a pattern, stay-at-home country squire, just let me
+know, as by that time I shall be wanting to see something unique.
+Good-by!  I have an important engagement," and without giving him time
+to offer his escort she was off.
+
+Lawrence remained where he was, and thought of Eileen, drawing back into
+deep shadow, and staring moodily down at the gay throng below him.
+After a long time, getting no nearer to a decision, he went below again
+and joined a small coterie of men about the Hon.  Jack Carew, discussing
+the probability of disturbances on the Afghan frontier in the spring.
+
+A few days later, while still in a state of indecision, he made the
+discovery that Gwen was in a fix.  He came upon her unexpectedly in the
+morning-room, and caught her with tears in her eyes before she had time
+to brush them away.  She did so angrily enough directly he entered, but
+by that time he had seen them.  Lawrence looked at her a moment, and
+then crossed and carefully closed the door and came back again.
+
+"What's the matter?" he asked, as if he meant to be told.
+
+"Nothing," she answered shortly.
+
+"When I came in your were crying."
+
+"No, I wasn't!" and she tossed her head.
+
+"Fibber," from Lawrence.
+
+"Well, I suppose I can please myself."
+
+"Not much good though, when I know the truth."
+
+"I tell you I wasn't crying," stamping her foot.
+
+"Very well, then, we'll begin again.  How did you manage to get such a
+cold, Gwen?"
+
+"I haven't a cold."
+
+"Indeed!  I thought your eyes were running."
+
+She made no reply.  Lawrence drew near and leaned on the table beside
+her.
+
+"What's the matter, chum?" he said coaxingly.
+
+"Oh! just everything," she broke out.  "I can't think why Heaven made
+men such fools."
+
+"Admirers getting entangled?" he asked.
+
+"Yes," pettishly.  "I believe Captain O'Connor is going to make Lord
+Selloyd fight."
+
+"You needn't worry.  Woolly lambs don't fight--they run away."
+
+"Oh, but can't you see how silly it is!" she cried in exasperation.  "It
+is bound to get round to the clubs, and then to the women, and mother
+will be furious.  I must make them come to their senses somehow."
+
+"What's it all about?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know," expressively.  "A storm in a tea-cup, of course, but
+you Irishmen are so ridiculously hot-headed.  Take a hot-headed Irishman
+and an Englishman who is a fool, and they're sure to do something silly.
+
+"I don't mind about them," running on, "but I do want to keep it from
+mother and father.  You see, they give me a lot of liberty, and they'll
+think I've been abusing it, and it really wasn't my fault this time,"
+and the tears sprang to her eyes again.
+
+"What happened?"
+
+"Well, it was at the Inglis' dance.  Lord Selloyd would follow me about,
+and Captain O'Connor got angry.  I think they had both had too much
+champagne for supper, and in the end they had a row."
+
+"Probably it has all blown over by now."
+
+"No, it hasn't.  They will both be at the Markhams' to-night, and it
+will be very unpleasant."
+
+"I shall be there," said Lawrence.  "Can't I see you through!"
+
+Gwen was thoughtful a few moments, and suddenly she looked up with an
+idea.
+
+"Look here, Lawrence," she said, "if I could once for all convince both
+of them it wasn't the least use thinking any more about me, I believe
+they'd just leave Calcutta, and no one would ever know there had been
+this bother."
+
+"And can't you?"
+
+"I can't by merely talking.  I must try and prove it--and I have an
+idea, Lawrence."
+
+"Say on."
+
+"If I could tell them I was engaged it would just simplify everything."
+Lawrence nodded, to show he was following, and waited.  "I can only do
+that with someone to corroborate it, and I've been thinking, Lawrence,
+if you wouldn't mind helping me, you're just the man."
+
+"I am ready for anything.  What do you want?"
+
+"I want you to be secretly engaged to me for this evening."
+
+Lawrence looked up, and there was amusement in his eyes.
+
+"It's a splendid idea," she exclaimed, warming to her subject.  "I shall
+tell Captain O'Connor and make him understand it can't be announced for
+some particular reason, and he'll be flattered at being told, and just
+keep it to himself and say no more.  You must, of course, be there
+yourself to sanction it or he might not believe it."
+
+Gwen talked on, and Lawrence listened, falling in with her plans easily
+enough because he saw no harm in the trick and it was the least trouble.
+When Mrs Carew joined them later, Gwen was radiant again and rather
+looking forward to her evening.  Afterward she was still more radiant,
+for everything had gone well.  Captain O'Connor, a fiery young officer,
+spending a month's leave in Calcutta before starting to England, was
+quickly brought to reason by Gwen's charming way of confiding in him,
+and, while announcing his intention of running himself through, in the
+same moment grasped Lawrence's hand, and told him he was the luckiest
+chap on earth.
+
+The next morning he did actually start for England, a week sooner than
+he intended, leaving Lord Selloyd to congratulate himself upon having
+got out of the quarrel so simply.
+
+The incident dispersed Gwen's passing displeasure with Lawrence also,
+and she condescended once more to mention the subject of the Adairs,
+asking him if he had decided what to do.  He was standing with his hands
+in his pockets looking out of the window, and for a moment he did not
+reply.  Gwen came and leaned against the window-frame beside him.
+
+"If you go, Lawrie, are you quite certain it would have to be the pretty
+one?" she asked.
+
+"Yes--quite," he answered.
+
+"Then stay here.  I'm awfully sorry for them--at least I'm sorry for
+Paddy," she continued, as he did not speak, "but I'm absolutely certain
+it would be a mistake for you to marry the other one.  Deep down in your
+heart you think so yourself, don't you?"
+
+"I have long been under the impression that I had no heart."
+
+"Rubbish!  Why, that's what people say about me, and do you think I
+don't know better!  When `John Right' comes along you'll all see I've
+got just as much heart as any one else, but until he does--a short life
+and a merry one, say I!  That's how it will be with you, Lawrie.  When
+Mary Jane Right turns up you'll tear your hair--what there is of it--and
+stamp, and rave, and storm, just like any other love-sick male.  Till
+then, if it pleases you to be cynical and _blase_, and all that
+nonsense, why, be cynical and _blase_; it doesn't hurt any one else--in
+fact, it's rather amusing," and she rested her hand on his arm and
+looked into his face with roguish, laughing eyes.  "I'd have just loved
+to have a brother," she said, "but, like that nice old General Adair who
+wanted a son, I guess I've got the next best thing."
+
+So, in the end, Lawrence did not return to England, and nothing happened
+to avert the hard change for Paddy and Eileen and their mother.
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY SIX.
+
+PADDY MAKES HER COUSIN'S ACQUAINTANCE.
+
+One of the first things Paddy did when she got to London was to quarrel
+with her cousin, Basil Adair.  Basil was a medical student, a young man
+who had somehow got a notion that the world would be in no end of a
+queer fix without him; but that, as long as he remained in it, he had no
+occasion to work or strive after anything except having a good time,
+spending a great deal of money and talking big.  He was rather curious
+about this new cousin who was coming to stay a few weeks with them, and
+inclined to be pleased at the idea of some one quite fresh to impress
+daily with his new clothes, immaculate boots, glossy head-gear, and
+generally magnificent appearance.  When he saw a black-robed,
+sallow-faced girl, with serious eyes and badly dressed hair, he was
+inclined to be satirical.  Paddy's mourning, hastily procured in Newry,
+did not meet with his approval at all, as indeed it was hardly likely to
+do, and black was the most unbecoming colour she could possibly wear.
+Still, he had a great idea of always doing the correct thing, so he came
+home to dinner the flint evening, and addressed various polite remarks
+to her, in a grandiloquent, not to say condescending, tone.
+
+Paddy looked at him as if he were a clothes-horse, and Basil was not
+pleased.  Half divining the same, Paddy looked again.  After dinner,
+when she had the opportunity of a nearer inspection, she looked with
+interest at the immaculate patent-leather boots, and took a calm survey
+of the whole effect.  Basil felt he was making an impression, and though
+he thought she was very plain and dowdy, he was a young man who could
+not have resisted trying to make an impression on a crossing sweeper.
+He took up his stand on the hearthrug, with his legs astride and his
+hands behind him, and looked down at her over his two-and-a-half-inch
+collar, prepared to continue his magnanimity.
+
+"Er--you don't know London, I believe--er--Miss Adair?" he began.
+
+"I have been here before," Paddy answered.  "I was at school here for
+about four months."
+
+"It is unfortunate," he continued, "that father's practice happens to
+be--er--in Shepherd's Bush, and that, therefore, you should have to
+become acquainted with London from such a--er--plebeian locality."
+
+"I don't see that it matters where you are, if you've got to be in
+London," said Paddy more bluntly than grammatically.
+
+"But London is a glorious place," he cried.  "To be in London is life,
+to be out of it is death.  London is--er--the centre of the world.  The
+centre of learning, and commerce, and--er--art, and--er--progress."
+
+"Don't they say the same about Paris, and Berlin, and New York, and lots
+of other places?" she asked calmly.
+
+"If they do, it is a lie.  London stands at the top of the pyramid built
+by the cities of the world."
+
+"Well, anyhow, I'd sooner have Omeath," said Paddy.
+
+"It is heresy," he cried, "rank heresy--and you an Englishwoman."
+
+"Irish," corrected Paddy, very decidedly.
+
+"Ah, yes, to be sure!  And I suppose you're--er--very proud of it.
+Funny thing how the Irish fancy their nationality."
+
+"Not half so funny as some of the things you fancy yourselves for over
+in England," she retorted, getting a little exasperated.
+
+Basil glanced down over his collar rather as if he were taking stock of
+a curious kind of animal, and Paddy began to fidget.  She was becoming
+more and more conscious of a desperate impulse to ruffle his hair, and
+tumble his collar, and disarrange generally this painfully well-dressed
+young man, with his air of extreme condescension.
+
+"Ah!" he said satirically, "you cultivate the art of repartee in
+Ireland--as well as potatoes."
+
+"We cultivate men, too," with scorn.  "You ought to go over there and
+finish your education."
+
+This rather took his breath away for a minute, and while he was
+recovering Paddy's mood changed.
+
+"That was rude," she said.  "I'm sorry."
+
+This surprised him still more, and he mentally designated her the oddest
+fish he had come across.
+
+"Oh, don't mention it," he replied with a paternal air.  "I like people
+who say what they think."  There was a pause, then he asked: "I suppose
+you are fond of theatres?"
+
+"I have never been to one."
+
+"Never been to a theatre!" he gasped.  "Impossible!  Why you haven't
+done anything!"
+
+Paddy leaned forward suddenly.  "Have you ever shot a snipe?" she said.
+
+"No," wonderingly.
+
+"Well, I have," and she closed her lips with an expressive snap, and
+there was a slight pause.
+
+"You're a--er--sportswoman then?" at last.
+
+"I don't shoot my bird sitting, if that's what you mean."
+
+Basil had no mind to reveal his ignorance upon sport generally, so he
+tried another tack, asking: "I suppose you have read all the new
+novels."
+
+"I have ready scarcely anything, except `The Jungle Tales,' `A Voyage in
+the Cachalot,' and the Bible.  I never had time to read."
+
+"Never had time!" he echoed.  "I thought people who lived in the country
+had no other way to kill time."
+
+Paddy did not reply, so he asked, "What did you do beside shoot, then!"
+
+"Oh, I could sail a bit, and fish a bit, and climb a bit.  Then there
+was the hockey club, and tennis club, and golf club.  The days weren't
+as a rule half long enough."
+
+Basil looked down with some show of interest.
+
+"You'll rather miss all that in London," he suggested.
+
+"I guess so," was Paddy's short, laconic response, and she fixed her
+eyes on the fire.
+
+"Still, there'll be lots of other things," he went on.  "Dances, and
+theatres, and--er--shops.  The guv'nor's awfully easy-going, you know--
+you won't have to do much work."
+
+"Do you mean Uncle Frank?" raising her eyebrows a little.
+
+"Yes, of course.  Why?"
+
+Paddy did not answer, and just then her aunt come back.
+
+"Basil, my dear," said his mother anxiously, "I don't like to think you
+are working so hard.  I'm sure you're not strong enough.  Last night it
+was quite one o'clock when I heard you moving about overhead."
+
+"Oh, that won't hurt me," carelessly, "and it's so much easier to read
+at night."
+
+Paddy looked at him keenly.
+
+"But, my dear boy, you must remember your health," continued his mother
+fondly.  "You must not let your zeal make you rash."
+
+Paddy grew meditative.  She had distinct recollections of her uncle
+saying Basil could not get through his exams, and implying that he did
+not work.  Her aunt turned to her.
+
+"You know the medical profession is such a hard one to get on in, my
+dear," she said, "and Basil has to be nearly always working.  I assure
+you it is a most unusual thing for him to spend an evening in the
+drawing-room like this.  He nearly always goes to the hospital, or works
+at a friend's rooms.  It is entirely for your sake, my dear, and I was
+very glad when I heard him say he could manage it."
+
+Paddy murmured something about being honoured, and a little later asked
+if she might be excused and go to bed, as she was very tired.
+
+Basil had something of a shock.  It was incredible for any girl to want
+to go to bed at nine o'clock when he was there.  When Paddy actually
+stood up and prepared to go, he concluded she had a headache and could
+not bear the light.  As a matter of fact poor Paddy was momentarily
+getting nearer breaking down altogether, and the instant her aunt closed
+the door and left her alone, she went down on her knees by the bedside
+and burst into tears.
+
+It had been such a terrible day--she thought she would never forget it
+as long as she lived.
+
+She and Jack had breakfasted together at Holyhead, where they remained
+until morning, and then he had seen her safely into the train to London.
+There had been tears in his sunny eyes, and Paddy had felt awful, but
+it had to be borne, and now he was on the sea sailing away--away from
+England and all of them.  It did, indeed, seem as if all the hard things
+possible had come upon them at once, and when she at last slipped into
+bed, she cried herself to sleep.
+
+The next day she went with her uncle to see about her dispensing and was
+fortunately able to start working at once, which left her less time to
+think.
+
+Nevertheless, often across her studies would steal the memory of the
+mountains and loch.  In fancy she would smell the heather or the peat,
+hear the curlews calling or the cry of the plover, the lapping of the
+little waves against the keel of the boat, or their light murmuring on
+the shingle; she would wonder what the aunties were doing, and how the
+hockey club was getting on with its new captain, and whether they all
+thought of her sometimes and missed her!  One big tear would gather and
+then another, and she would dash them angrily away, fighting day by day
+with steady persistence the passionate longing, the sometimes passionate
+determination, to throw everything to the winds and go back and live on
+crusts, if need be, beside her beloved lake.  Sometimes these fits left
+her very sore and irritable, and it was in such a mood she had her first
+real quarrel with Basil, about three weeks after her arrival.  She
+hardly knew what it was all about, neither did he, but he started
+holding forth in his usual high fashion upon London and Londoners being
+the salt of the earth, with certain vague innuendoes about well-cut,
+tailor-made dresses and a smart style, until Paddy grew exasperated
+beyond endurance, and informed him, none too politely, that he was only
+fitted to stand in tailor's window, as a model of an empty-headed,
+well-dressed, curled and pampered modern young man, with about as much
+real manhood in him as a wax doll.
+
+Having delivered herself of this somewhat pointed speech, in a highly
+impressive fashion, she flung out of the room and slammed the door
+behind her in a way that shook the jerry-built Shepherd's Bush villa to
+its very foundation.  It shook his lordship, Basil Adair, gasping into a
+large arm-chair with open mouth and eyes, for the onslaught had very
+literally taken his breath away.
+
+"By Jove," he breathed, "I hope the roof's securely fastened on.  What
+in the name of fortune did the guv'nor bring this whirlwind--this
+tornado--this positive monsoon--into a suburban villa for?"
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN.
+
+PADDY HAS A VISITOR.
+
+When Paddy was alone in her room her anger quickly evaporated, and was
+as quickly replaced by an overpowering sense of loneliness.  Why, oh
+why, had they let her come to London alone?  Why had Fate dealt her this
+double blow!  "Daddy, daddy," she breathed piteously, and buried her
+face in her hands.  For a moment she longed to be away there in the
+quiet churchyard beside him.  It seemed to her quite impossible that
+life would ever be glad again, since he was gone, and Jack was gone, and
+strangers were probably already moving into The Ghan House.
+
+But presently the mood passed and she was calmer, remembering all the
+responsibility on her shoulders.
+
+"Don't forget you're an Irish Fusilier's daughter, Paddy," she
+admonished herself severely, "and you promised to be a good son.  Irish
+Fusiliers' daughters don't cry like babies, just because everything
+seems to have gone wrong; and a good son is more sorry for his mother
+than himself."
+
+A few minutes later there was a knock at her door, and the maid told her
+a gentleman had called to see her.
+
+"A gentleman?" asked Paddy in surprise.  "What is his name?"
+
+"I'm afraid I didn't catch it," the maid answered.  "It was a long
+name."
+
+"Are you sure he asked for me?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Where is he?"
+
+"In the drawing-room.  Mr Basil has gone out, and Mrs Adair is in the
+master's surgery."
+
+Paddy smoothed her hair and bathed her eyes, feeling very curious, but
+when she walked into the drawing-room her visitor saw at a glance that
+she had been crying.
+
+"Mr Masterman!" she exclaimed in glad surprise, and Ted came forward
+eagerly enough.  After the first greetings, however, there was a
+slightly awkward pause.
+
+"I only heard about everything last week," said Ted at last.  "My aunt
+is a very bad correspondent.  I need hardly say how her letter shocked
+me."
+
+Paddy had motioned to him to take a chair, and sat down on the sofa; but
+Ted, being no less masterful than of old, and quite as certain as to his
+mind, sat down on the sofa beside her instead.
+
+"I can't tell you just all I feel," he said, in that quiet, convincing
+way of his.  "I wish I could, but I think you must know it has all been
+like a personal sorrow."
+
+"You are very good," Paddy murmured gratefully.  She was so glad to see
+him--he was like the first link from the old home since she parted from
+Jack at Holyhead.
+
+"How did you know I was here!"
+
+"I wired to my aunt for your address directly I received the letter.  I
+wanted to call sooner, but was prevented by business.  We have been kept
+late at the works every night for a week.  I'm afraid this London
+arrangement will be very hard on you," he said, so kindly that Paddy
+felt the tears coming back.
+
+"A little," she answered, trying to pull herself together, "but it won't
+be so bad when I'm used to it."
+
+She tried to meet his eyes, but could not, and instead looked away,
+blinking hard.
+
+"Poor little girl," said Ted in a very low voice, half to himself, and
+covered his eyes with his hand a moment, as if there was something in
+them he felt he must hide from her.  She little knew how that pair of
+strong arms beside her ached to fold her tight, and take her away then
+and there from this London she so hated.
+
+"I wish I could do something," he said at last.  "It's hard to have to
+sit still, and feel as I feel, and see no way to help."
+
+"You mustn't take it like that," trying to speak brightly.  "Mother and
+Eileen will be here soon, and then it will be much better for me."
+
+"What has become of O'Hara?" he asked.  "Will you tell me all about
+everything?"
+
+Paddy was only too glad to have someone who knew all about Omeath and
+The Ghan House, and she readily described all that had happened since he
+left.  Ted listened quietly, leaning back a little, as once before, that
+he might the better watch her, with his own strong face in the shadow.
+
+"It will be the making of him," was his comment when she came to Jack's
+plans, and Paddy agreed with alacrity.
+
+When she had finished he looked at her, with a slightly wistful look in
+his grey eyes, and said:
+
+"Now may I tell you about my affairs?"
+
+"Yes, do."
+
+"I'm following O'Hara's lead and leaving England," and he looked hard
+into her face.
+
+"Leaving England!" she repeated, with frank dismay--indeed, far too
+frank for Ted, who was sufficiently wise in these matters to know that
+such a complete absence of self-consciousness left but little room for
+him to hope in.
+
+"Yes," dropping his eyes gloomily to the carpet.  "At once."
+
+"I _am_ sorry," she said expressively.  "Why do you go?  What is
+happening to England that you and Jack and Lawrence Blake and everyone
+must all go abroad?"
+
+"Lawrence Blake?" he asked, in some surprise.
+
+Paddy coloured painfully.
+
+"Yes, didn't you know?  He went to India a month after the dance."
+
+Ted watched her inquiringly, uncertain whether or not to ask a
+particular question.
+
+Paddy settled the matter for him.
+
+"It was rather a good thing," she said, trying to speak naturally.  "He
+and Eileen were hovering on the brink of an engagement, and it would not
+have been a suitable match.  He would never have made a girl like Eileen
+happy."
+
+Ted drew his own conclusions, but all he said, was:
+
+"O'Hara will get his chance now--lucky beggar," and then suddenly
+relapsed into thought, as it dawned upon him it might in the end mean
+his own chance, too.
+
+"You have not told me why you are going abroad?" she said, after a
+pause.
+
+"I am going to South Africa for the firm I am with."
+
+"For good?"
+
+"For several years, I expect."
+
+"Why do you go?"
+
+"Well, you see," he began slowly, "it's a very good opening for a man
+who wants to get on, and I want that even more now than I ever wanted it
+before."  She waited, and he continued: "Engineering is rather overdone
+in England, and it's very hard work to get any kind of a real footing at
+all.  The firm is opening a big, new branch in Africa, and they have
+offered me the managership.  It is a very good thing, and I have
+accepted it."
+
+"But still," reasoned Paddy, "you were all right as you were before."
+
+He smiled a little.
+
+"No, that's just it.  I wasn't all right.  You see, Miss Adair, there
+comes a time in a man's life when he suddenly wakes up to the fact that
+he'd desperately like a home of his own, and that makes him think more
+seriously of the pounds, shillings, and pence.  I want my home to be
+right in the country, too," he added whimsically, half to himself, "if
+possible, where there are mountains and a loch and plenty of fishing and
+shooting."
+
+Paddy said nothing, but she felt a queer little thrill all down her
+back.  She turned her head away and stared hard into the glowing coals.
+She knew his eyes were fixed searchingly on her face, but she would not
+look round, nor give him the chance to see the consciousness in her own.
+He leaned back presently with a little sigh.
+
+"I'd rather have thought of you running wild at Omeath still," he said,
+"but it can't be helped, and I shall have to make the best of it.
+Perhaps, sometimes you'll be glad to feel there's some one thinking of
+you, some one awfully sorry for you, across the sea.  At least, I hope
+you won't forget altogether?"
+
+Still Paddy kept her face averted.
+
+"I shall not forget," was all she would say.
+
+"I wonder if it would be too much to ask for an occasional letter," he
+went on.  "Perhaps, if you remembered what a boon it would be to the
+exile--?"
+
+"Oh, yes, I'll write to you sometimes," with frankness.  "I dare say I
+shall be glad to air my opinions upon London and things generally, now
+and again."
+
+"Not so glad as I shall be to get them.  How I wish I could have been
+here and, perhaps, helped you all a little, and still had the good
+position.  I could at least have taken you to theatres, and down the
+river."
+
+"It would have been nice," she assented.
+
+"I may get back in four years," he continued, "but hardly before."
+
+"When do you sail?"
+
+"Next week."
+
+"Next week!" in astonishment.  "How near it seems."
+
+"Yes."  He hesitated.  "May I come and see you again!"
+
+"Of course you must come and say good-by."
+
+"Very well then.  Next Friday evening!"
+
+It was agreed so, and just then Mrs Adair and the doctor came in, and
+after a little Ted rose to go.
+
+The following Friday, as luck would have it, Basil took it into his head
+to remain at home, and ensconced himself in the drawing-room as if he
+meant to stay.  When Ted arrived he was still there, and Paddy felt
+vexed.  Her feelings, however, were nothing to Ted's.  He would gladly
+have picked the young man up by his collar and dropped him out of the
+window into the street below.  After half-an-hour of vain efforts to
+keep the conversation going naturally, the kindly doctor himself came to
+the rescue.
+
+"I'm sure these young people would like to talk over old times together
+without us," he said, "as they're not to meet again for so long.  Come
+along, my dear, we'll go to my room as usual, and Basil can come too."
+
+Basil looked annoyed, but could hardly do other than follow the others
+from the room, though he loftily declined the invitation to the surgery.
+
+"Is that young man your cousin!" asked Ted when they were alone.
+
+"Yes, but I'm not proud of the relationship," said outspoken Paddy.
+
+Ted only smiled.  He could afford to be more magnanimous now he had
+gone.  He got up and strolled round the room, not because he was tired
+of sitting at all, but because he was thus enabled to make an entirely
+free choice of where he would sit down again.  Paddy was on the sofa, so
+as it is much easier to talk to anyone from the same sofa, instead of
+shouting from another chair, he chose the vacant space beside her.
+Paddy fidgeted with her hands, and again took to studying the glowing
+coals as if she had never seen a fire before.
+
+"Do you know I have taken a great liberty?" he said presently.
+
+"Yes!" looking up.
+
+"I've--well, I've taken upon myself to bring you a small talisman.  You
+won't be angry with me?"
+
+"I think it is very nice of you."
+
+"And you'll accept it?" eagerly.
+
+"What is it?" turning to the coals again.
+
+Ted took a little parcel from his pocket, and unfolded a very valuable
+old gold coin with a hole in it.
+
+"It's a lucky coin," he said.  "I noticed you had a chain bracelet and I
+thought, perhaps, you wouldn't mind letting me fix it on for you.  It's
+rather a rare one.  My father was a great collector, and it used to
+belong to him."
+
+"Oh! but you mustn't give it to me then," she cried.
+
+"Yes, I want to," firmly, "and I am going to fix it on myself."
+
+She gave him her bracelet, impelled by some unseen force, and watched
+him silently while he carefully fixed the coin to one of the links.  A
+little while afterward he wrung her hand, looked a whole world of love
+into her eyes, and hurried away.
+
+When Paddy was alone, she became unusually thoughtful, and fingered the
+coin gently.  Then for the first time she discovered something had been
+engraved on it, and held it curiously to the light.  In small writing,
+across the centre, were the two words, "Dinna forget," and underneath
+the date of the morrow when his ship would sail.
+
+"Poor Ted," murmured Paddy softly, and a little flush crept into her
+white cheeks.
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT.
+
+THE NEW HOME.
+
+It was not until March, when Paddy had been in London over two months,
+that her mother and Eileen joined her.  By that time she and the doctor
+had the furniture all in place and everything ready.  A letter Paddy
+received the last day rather surprised her.
+
+"Do not meet us," Eileen wrote, "nor wait at uncle's for us.  We
+particularly want to receive you in our own little home, and shall be
+eagerly watching for you about six o'clock."
+
+Paddy thought it rather queer, but fell in with their wishes, and went
+off as usual to her classes.  When she reached home in the evening
+Eileen was watching at the little front bow-window and flew to the door,
+her mother following closely, and none of the three knew quite whether
+to laugh or cry, they were all so glad and so sad together.
+
+"It's just good to have a home again," said Paddy, and bustled into the
+little sitting-room while her mother and Eileen exchanged glances.  No
+sooner had she entered than she gave a cry of delight, for there, on
+each side of the fireplace, in their usual manner, sat the two aunties.
+The next moment they were both pleading for mercy in stifled tones
+beneath her vigorous hugs.
+
+"You dear, _dear_, dear aunties!" she cried; "to come all this long way
+at such a cold time of year.  How I just love you both!  I shall have to
+go on hugging you all the evening.  However did you make up your minds
+to come?"
+
+"Well, you see, dear," said Aunt Jane, "we could never have rested
+content without being quite sure you were all as comfortable as
+circumstances would permit, and so we felt the only thing to do was to
+come and see for ourselves."
+
+"Yes," nodded little Miss Mary, "we have come to see for ourselves."
+
+The tea-table caught Paddy's eye then, and she had to go into raptures
+over again.
+
+"Omeath eggs!" she cried.  "Omeath ham!--cream! honey!--marmalade!--
+parsonage tea cakes!--parsonage scones--parsonage apple pie!  Oh,
+goodness! how ill I shall be to-morrow!  Was ever such a
+delicious-looking meal!  I shall be practising dispensing upon the whole
+household, I expect, in a few hours."  And then, just to relieve her
+feelings, she started hugging everybody over again, until the two poor
+little ladies' caps were at such an impossible angle they were obliged
+to retire to put them straight.
+
+"If only Jack were here," Paddy said longingly, as they sat down, "what
+a lovely occasion for a scramble it would be!"
+
+"We have had a letter from him," said Miss Jane, in a glad voice.  "You
+shall see it afterward.  He has reached Buenos Aires safely and had a
+good voyage, and he gives a wonderful description of the flowers and
+loveliness of Montevideo.  It is nice to think that the boy is seeing
+something of the world at last.  We ought to have sent him abroad
+before.  I am afraid we were very selfish."  And little Miss Mary chimed
+in with mournful agreement.
+
+"Oh, no, you weren't," asserted Paddy; "nothing of the kind.  Jack was
+lazy, and I encouraged him, and it just serves us both right to have to
+work hard now."
+
+They asked her how she was getting on with her studying, and she looked
+gravely mischievous and said, "Pretty middling."
+
+"You see," she continued, "medicines are very confusing.  They're nearly
+all water, with a little colouring, but the various colourings have long
+Latin names to give them an air of importance, and it's very hard to
+remember which high-sounding name belongs to which colouring.  I have to
+study a very learned book called the `Materia Medica,' but I haven't yet
+succeeded in making any sense of a single page and I have my doubts
+whether there is really any sense in the whole book.  But I like going
+to the hospital," she ran on.  "The matron is nice and the nurses are
+jolly.  The dispenser and I generally contrive to get tea in the
+dispensary in the afternoon, and whichever of them can manage it slips
+down and has a cup with us.  Both the tea and bread and butter usually
+get flavoured with the nastiest drug lying about, but that is a mere
+detail."
+
+"What is Aunt Edith like, and how do you get on with Basil?" they asked.
+
+"Aunt Edith is like Mrs Masterman, and looks as if she was left over
+from a hundred years ago.  She always speaks of Basil as `_dear_ Basil'
+or `_poor dear_ Basil,' according as he has been over-working or
+over-spending, and she spends a great deal of time in church, and talks
+about the `poor dear clergyman' and the `poor dear choir boys,' and
+discusses a different guild every evening in the week.  She has only two
+real ideas in the world--one is the church and the other is Basil; and
+they agree in one thing--they never stop asking her for money.  Uncle is
+a sort of fixture, like the blinds or the kitchen range, but he doesn't
+seem to mind so long as he can follow his profession in peace, and he is
+just the dearest and kindest man in the world."
+
+"And how do you get on with Basil?" they asked again.
+
+"Well, I don't get on at all," and Paddy looked amused.  "I don't think
+we're on speaking terms just now--we are not as a rule.  Before I had
+been there a month I told him he was not fitted for anything but a
+dressed-up mummy in a tailor's window, and a few other similar things,
+and for a time our relations were very strained.  We indulge in home
+truths concerning each other so often that I find it difficult to
+remember when we are on speaking terms and when not.  He is rather fond
+of making sarcastic reflections upon Irish dressmakers and countrified
+style, and of course I have to hit back from the shoulder for the sake
+of the old country."
+
+They could not help laughing, but her mother quickly grew grave and
+looked a little anxious.
+
+"I hope you don't carry it too far, my dear," she said.  "I would not
+like to hurt your uncle's and aunt's feelings after all their kindness."
+
+"Don't you be afraid, mother," cheerfully.  "Uncle enjoys it, and aunt
+doesn't understand half we say.  She generally misses the point, you
+see, and thinks I am paying Basil compliments.  Uncle, on the other
+hand, sees that it is only his welfare I have at heart."
+
+She then went on to tell them about Ted Masterman--all except the
+incident of the coin--and the doctor at the classes, and her friends the
+'bus drivers, chattering away like her old self again for very happiness
+at having them all round her.  They sat in a semicircle over the fire
+until late into the night, and finally went to bed too tired after their
+long day, and too pleased at being together again, to have time to be
+miserable.
+
+Only when they were alone Paddy asked Eileen if she had heard from
+Lawrence, and with a faint blush Eileen acknowledged that she had.
+After a moment's hesitation she produced the letter and gave it to Paddy
+to read.
+
+"It is a nice one," was all Paddy said, as she folded it up afterward.
+"He could always be nice if it happened to please him."
+
+Eileen made no reply.  It was not a subject she could discuss, and she
+knew, moreover, that it was one upon which she and Paddy could never
+agree.  For she had not forgotten Lawrence at all, and still, deep down
+in her heart, lived a hope that she could not extinguish.  When we
+desire a thing with a great and terrible longing, it is very hard to
+honestly and squarely face the fact that it can never be ours.  If there
+is any possible chance of fitting in a "perhaps," that "perhaps" is
+pretty sure to be there.  Eileen had managed to find more than one
+chance, and the really nice letter that Lawrence had written her
+directly he heard of the General's death, and while the news still had a
+softening effect upon him, had only more firmly entrenched them.
+
+It was unfortunate, but it was the way of the world.  The fine-strung
+nervous system that holds the deepest capacity for suffering is oftenest
+jarred upon and hurt by rough, careless hands and cold, selfish hearts.
+And always, too, are these the sufferers who hope and remember the
+longest in spite of all.
+
+Paddy felt vaguely that Eileen still loved and still hoped and her loyal
+heart was furious with Lawrence.  But she was obliged to content herself
+with scathingly picking his letter to pieces in her own mind, for she
+recognised that no good could some of saying these kind of things to
+Eileen, and she would just have to stand aside and let matters take
+their own course.
+
+"I suppose he might come back," she reasoned, with a worried feeling;
+"but it is not very likely, and a very questionable benefit if he did."
+
+Yet, when, as the days went by, she saw the quiet sadness still
+paramount in Eileen's eyes, and knew that all her happiness was forced,
+she felt a great longing to have it settled one way or another for all
+their sakes.  The shadow hung heavily upon the mother also, and Paddy
+easily saw that it was not London and her loss only that kept her so
+worn and ill-looking.
+
+It was just when things were in this state, by a most strange
+coincidence, that Paddy heard news of Lawrence partly through her cousin
+Basil.  Now that they did not five under the same roof, they managed to
+keep better friends, though Paddy never missed the smallest opportunity
+of a taunt at Basil's effeminacy, and Basil still persisted in veiled
+hints at her general lack of elegance.  However, as both were already
+profiting by the other's plain speaking, it was very harmless.  Paddy,
+on her part, had become very friendly with another girl student, who, in
+the matter of appearance, was the exact opposite of herself, and she was
+beginning to benefit by the friendship.  Ethel Matheson was a true
+Londoner of the modern type, which represents a girl quite as fond of
+outdoor games as a country girl, but at the same time having the
+unmistakable cut of London about her clothes.  Well-cut tailor-mades,
+simple, smart hats, hair well dressed, gloves and boots always neat,
+made Ethel a pleasing picture in any weather and at any time, and before
+long Paddy began to envy her.  After a time she got so far as to mention
+it, and from that day the change commenced.  Ethel took her in hand
+altogether, and guaranteed that in a few months, if Paddy would give her
+mind to it seriously, she would turn her out as neat and smart as
+herself, and only spend a fraction more money.  Consequently, when the
+spring was well advanced, Paddy invested in her first smart
+"tailor-made," a very pretty hat, and began to take pains with her hair.
+The very first time she was out in them, feeling not a little
+conscious, but on the whole well pleased with herself, she ran into
+Basil going home on the top of a 'bus.
+
+"By Jove!" said Basil.  "If it isn't Paddy!--all in new clothes!"
+
+"Well, there's no occasion to be rude," retorted Paddy.  "Any one would
+think you were not accustomed to new clothes instead of dreaming and
+thinking of little else."
+
+Two men, who, unknown to her, were accompanying Basil, began to laugh,
+and Paddy blushed a fiery red when her cousin, with considerable
+enjoyment, proceeded to introduce them to her.
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY NINE.
+
+A STRANGE COINCIDENCE.
+
+"Let me introduce my friends to you," he said.  "This is Pat O'Connor,
+of your own proud nationality, known as the lady-killer of Middlesex
+Hospital, and this is his brother, Captain O'Connor, of Dargai renown,
+now home on leave from India.  Gentlemen," he added wickedly, "allow me
+to introduce you to Miss Paddy Adair, the snipe-shooter."
+
+Paddy blushed again, which was most becoming to her, and Basil could not
+help looking candidly surprised, though he forbore from any more
+personalities at present.  The individual introduced as Captain O'Connor
+was sitting next to Paddy, and she was rather glad, as "lady-killers"
+were not in her line, and she liked the look of this sunburnt soldier.
+She commenced chatting to him at once in her pleasant, friendly way, and
+Captain O'Connor was more than pleased.  With the delightful humility of
+his nation, his first thought was--"Any one would have known she's
+Irish, she's so nice."
+
+Presently the topic of India was introduced, that of their respective
+Irish counties and the general perfection of the Emerald Isle becoming a
+little exhausted, and the Captain told her about the gayeties of the
+hill stations, and of Calcutta during the season.
+
+"I stayed two or three weeks in Calcutta," he told her, "on my way home,
+as I knew I should have quite as good a time there as in England."  He
+suddenly became thoughtful, as if struck by some memory, and with equal
+suddenness turned upon her with the startling remark:
+
+"By the way, Lawrence Blake comes from near Omeath.  Do you know him?"
+
+Paddy was so taken aback, she caught her breath with a little gasp
+before she answered.
+
+"Yes, very well indeed."
+
+"How odd," said the Captain and paused.
+
+"Why?" eyeing him keenly.
+
+He coloured under his sunburn.
+
+"Oh, nothing," and then after a moment--as if changing his mind--"He's
+engaged to a great friend of mine."
+
+"Engaged!" exclaimed Paddy, too taken aback to hide her astonishment.
+
+"Yes; why!" and this time it was Captain O'Connor's turn to look with
+keen eyes.
+
+"Oh, nothing!" she answered, "only I'm rather surprised I hadn't heard
+of it.  Whom is he engaged to?"
+
+"The Hon.  Grant-Carew's daughter.  She's well known over there."
+
+"Do you know her?" unable to hide her curiosity.
+
+"Yes, very well."
+
+"What is she like?"
+
+He paused a moment.
+
+"She's the most beautiful girl I've ever seen," he said at last, with
+conviction.
+
+For some minutes Paddy was silent.
+
+"Are you quite sure they're engaged?" she asked presently.
+
+"Quite.  I had it from her own lips, and congratulated the two of them
+the same evening.  It hadn't been publicly announced yet, but she had
+her own reasons for telling me then.  He's rich, isn't he?  I hope so,
+because she's the sort of girl who ought to have just everything she
+wants.  He's a thundering lucky chap," and poor Guy looked sufficiently
+miserable to make his own part in the story very plain.
+
+"Yes, he's rich," Paddy answered, "and he has a lovely place near
+Omeath.  I wonder when they will be married?  I don't like the idea of
+somebody fresh coming there at all.  I'm sure I shan't like her."
+
+"I think you will.  She's very popular in India.  Everybody likes her."
+
+"I'm rather difficult to please," asserted Miss Paddy with her nose in
+the air and Guy O'Connor wondered why she seemed so unnecessarily down
+upon both Gwendoline and Lawrence.
+
+At Lancaster Gate the two brothers got off, and Paddy and Basil
+proceeded alone.  Paddy was very thoughtful, and Basil wanted to talk,
+which made her somewhat cross.
+
+"I don't know what's happened to you," he said.  "You're looking real
+stunning!  I could scarcely believe my eyes when I first saw you."
+
+"Don't talk nonsense," snapped Paddy.  "I've only got a new dress on,
+and there's nothing so very extraordinary in that."
+
+"But there is," he insisted, "it's all very extraordinary.  The last
+time I saw you, you were just dressed anyhow, and suggested
+milking-stools and hayfields; now you're--well, you're a Londoner."
+
+"I'm _not_," emphatically.  "I wouldn't be a Londoner for all the
+world--grasping, conceited, money-grubbing lot."
+
+"Whew!" whistled Basil softly.  "What's Captain O'Connor been saying to
+get her little temper up?"
+
+"Nothing, only you're so silly, and I haven't the patience to talk to
+boys."
+
+Basil proceeded to do a little sum on his fingers, looking abnormally
+grave.
+
+"Umph! thirty-five I should think," he said musingly, "though you hardly
+look it.  No chicken that! eh--what?"
+
+Paddy was obliged to burst out laughing.
+
+"Do you know I think you're improving rather," she told him.  "You
+aren't half such a namby-pamby coxcomb as you were when I first came to
+London at Christmas."
+
+"Not easy when you're about," he commented, adding, "I think we might be
+said to have formed a mutual improvement society.  If you only knew what
+you looked like that first night!  A sort of antediluvian Joan of Arc!
+I thought you were the oddest fish I had ever come across."
+
+"Why Joan of Arc?"
+
+"Because you had war in your eyes from the first moment we met.  I
+didn't recognise it so quickly then as I should now, but I couldn't help
+seeing you didn't mean to waste much cousinly affection on me."
+
+"I thought you were an awful idiot," she remarked, with smiling candour.
+
+"And you tried to show it with more force than politeness; which was
+cheek when you weren't anything much to boast of yourself."
+
+They had reached the terminus and now climbed down, walking off homeward
+together at a brisk pace.
+
+"By the way, how's that long-legged, broad-shouldered British bull-dog
+specimen who came to say good-by before going to South Africa?" he
+asked.
+
+"Umph! sour grapes!" with a little snort.
+
+Basil was pleased.  He felt as if he were getting a little of his own
+back again.
+
+"Feeling a bit love-sick, eh?" he asked.
+
+"If I were, I should think I had caught it from you," scathingly.
+
+"Oh, I've given all that sort of thing up now; but I'm naturally
+interested in your affairs, being a cousin.  When did he say he should
+be back?"
+
+"I didn't ask him."
+
+"Ah!  I expect he had already told you."
+
+"He had not."
+
+"What! not when he asked you if you'd have diamonds or emeralds?"
+
+"He wouldn't be likely to be so silly, and if you can't talk sense,
+Basil Adair, for heaven's sake don't talk at all."
+
+Basil laughed outright then with great enjoyment.
+
+"It's such fun to tease you, Paddy," he said.  "You do get so
+deliriously wild about nothing.  Good-night," as they reached her door.
+"Don't fling the plates about when you get in, it's such an expensive
+amusement," and he went off down the road.
+
+All evening Paddy remained moody and preoccupied, revolving in her mind
+how to tell Eileen about Lawrence.  In the end she waited until
+bed-time, and they were alone.  She then began a long rigmarole about
+the extraordinariness of coincidence, which made Eileen look at her with
+wonderment, and question in her own mind if she had a bad headache or
+anything.  Paddy noticed it, but held on until she was hopelessly and
+inextricably mixed up, and then, after all her fine preparation, she
+suddenly blurted out:
+
+"Lawrence Blake is engaged.  I heard it from a friend of his this
+afternoon."
+
+Eileen turned deathly white and gripped a table near her.  She looked as
+if she were going to faint.
+
+"Oh, Eily! don't look like that!" cried poor Paddy.  "What a blundering
+idiot I am.  Oh! don't take it to heart dreadfully--he isn't worth it--
+really, really, he isn't."
+
+It was too late for Eileen to prevaricate, so she just sat down and
+leaned her face in her hands and said, "Tell me about it."
+
+Paddy told her all she knew, and how she had heard of Gwendoline Carew
+before and seen her photograph, but how, when she taxed Lawrence, he had
+denied there was anything between them.
+
+"I suppose he was just hesitating," she finished, "and as soon as he got
+back to her he made up his mind."
+
+Eileen said nothing.  It was a bitter blow to her, but no words could
+ease it now.  Paddy, however, slipped down on her knees and threw her
+arms round her.
+
+"Eily, Eily!" she cried.  "I'll kill him, I will indeed, if you take it
+to heart so.  I don't know how he dare hurt you, but you are well rid of
+him; he is just a scoundrel and no gentleman at all, and he would never
+have made you happy.  I am quite sure he never would.  You didn't know
+him so well as I did.  I used to hear from Kathleen how queer he was at
+home.  Sometimes he would scarcely speak for days, and he just damped
+everything for them all; but he was so selfish he did not care.  And I
+hate to tell tales, but I am not sure that he doesn't drink, Eileen.  He
+used to at one time.  I feel awful to think you are unhappy through him,
+but I'd feel more awful still, I think, if you were going to marry him."
+
+Eileen kissed her, but still remained silent.  What was there to say?
+She had loved this man, she had given him of her best, encouraged and
+attracted by his attentions, and now at last she knew indeed that what
+he had won he did not want, and all he had said meant nothing.  She
+remembered the incident in the boat--she remembered the half-hour in the
+conservatory at the dance--ah! she would not easily forget that; but how
+it hurt her, oh! how it _hurt_ that this man she loved had proved
+himself fickle and false.  She hid her face in her hands--her eyeballs
+burnt and scorched, her head throbbed wildly, but she could not cry.
+She felt as if all her tears were dried up for good.
+
+"Don't say anything to mother, Paddy," she managed to plead at last.
+"Keep it just between you and me.  By and by I shall feel better about
+it, and then I will tell her myself."
+
+Paddy was crying quietly now; she was devoted to her only sister and
+cared as much as if the pain had been hers.  For the time all thought of
+her own feelings went out of her mind, and with true unselfishness she
+pleaded for Jack.  But Eileen only shook her head.
+
+"I couldn't love Jack in that way," she said with quiet resolve.  In her
+heart she felt she could never love any one in that way again, but she
+did not say so to Paddy.  She waited until her sister's regular
+breathing told her she was asleep, and then had it out by herself in the
+kindly darkness of the night.
+
+And Paddy went to sleep vowing vengeance black and overwhelming upon the
+cause of her sister's misery.
+
+"He shall suffer for it yet," she told herself.  "I, for one, will never
+forgive him; and if I can make him pay, I will."
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY.
+
+AN ENCOUNTER.
+
+In July Paddy had to go up for her examination, and for days she was in
+a fever of nervous anxiety about it.
+
+"What's it matter!"  Basil said.  "Examinations never worry me."
+
+"They wouldn't me if I didn't care whether I passed or not."
+
+"Well, why do you?  It's silly, I think."
+
+"Umph!" expressively.  "If I were a man I'd sooner sweep a crossing than
+live on my mother."
+
+Basil flushed and bit his lip.  Things had been going so easily and
+pleasantly with him for years, that it was extremely trying to have
+these pointed remarks hurled at his head.
+
+"The mater likes it," he grunted.
+
+"Well, you see, she has your delicate health so much at heart,"
+sarcastically.  "I wonder she let you come out without an overcoat this
+morning.  I do hope you won't take cold."
+
+"Chuck it!" and he frowned gloomily.  Presently he glanced up.
+
+"Look here, Paddy!" he said.  "If you get through your exam, I'm hanged
+if I don't buck up, and get through mine, too."
+
+"You'd better begin working to-night," she answered, "for I mean to
+pass," and she shut her lips with a determination that spoke volumes.
+
+And she did pass too--one of the three girls out of the whole number who
+had only worked for six months, and there was great rejoicing in the
+little jerry-built villa.  Eileen went with her to the hall where the
+examination was held, and waited all the time she was there.  Before
+Paddy appeared Basil joined her.
+
+"It matters a good deal to me," he told Eileen, "because if she passes
+I've got to start working to pass too."
+
+When Paddy came her eyes shone so, there was no occasion to ask her
+anything.
+
+"Oh, Eileen," she said, "do you think I might dance a jig right here!
+Faith! and indaid!--I'm that plaized--!"
+
+Basil was pleased too, though he would have thought it bad form to show
+it too much.
+
+"Let's go and have a beano," he said.  "We'll dine at the Trocadero and
+then go to Daly's."
+
+"Oh, but I must rush home and tell mother."
+
+"We can wire," and he succeeded in persuading them to go with him to the
+nearest telegraph office and dispatch telegrams to Mrs Adair and the
+aunties; and then they trooped away delightedly to the Trocadero.  Paddy
+dearly loved dining out in this way, and all those sitting near them
+could not refrain from glancing again and again at the table from which
+such a genuinely happy laugh rang out.  Even Eileen was gay that
+evening, and Basil surpassed himself with tales of the medical students
+and the comic side of hospital life.
+
+When they at last got home they found Mrs Adair waiting with tears of
+gladness, for she knew how bitterly Paddy would have felt it had she
+failed.  The following week they all went off to Seaforth for a month,
+neither Mrs Adair nor Eileen being well, and consequently the long
+journey to Omeath was pronounced too trying, and the nearer English
+seaside place decided upon.
+
+When they came back Paddy was duly installed as dispenser in her uncle's
+surgery; and her hours being nine to eleven and half-past five to eight,
+she was kept fairly busy.  This was fortunate, as it left her little
+time to mope, as she would otherwise have done.  For as the weeks sped
+by Paddy could not in any degree grow reconciled to London, and when
+they first returned from Seaforth it seemed more hideous to her than
+ever.  She hated Shepherd's Bush with all her strength, and secretly
+much missed the daily journey to Chancery Lane, which had at least been
+interesting.  To this free-born mountain-child the cramped streets, the
+dingy rows of ugly little houses, the whole atmosphere of this London
+suburb, were positively repulsive; and she felt as if she were in a
+cage, against which she was ever beating and bruising her wings in a
+vain longing to escape.  It was much the same to Eileen and her mother,
+only they were made in a less vigorous mould, and it was not so hard for
+them to bear up, helped as they were by a religion which was very real
+and very true.  Paddy's religion, it must be confessed, was chiefly her
+father.  She stuck to her dispensing manfully because she had promised
+to be a good son, but deep in her heart she nursed a silent soreness
+against God that He had let things come to this pass.  It was, perhaps,
+wrong of her, but no doubt that brave loyalty to her promise, covered
+much weakness in the eyes of Him who understandeth the secrets of every
+heart, their soreness as well as their patience.  Also, when Eileen's
+defences did break down, she suffered even more for the time being.
+Paddy could fling about and hurl out vigorous sarcasms, in which poor
+Shepherd's Bush got even more than its due of opprobrium, but which
+relieved her feelings a good deal, while Eileen could only fight it out
+silently alone.  And whereas the mountains and loch represented so much
+fun and adventure to Paddy, they had been actual friends and companions
+to Eileen, and no one knew how terribly she missed them, nor what an
+utter loneliness there was in her heart.  At these times she could not
+but turn gladly to Jack's occasional letters.  They were not brilliant
+specimens of either penmanship or composition, but there was the true
+ring of the man himself about them, with his breeziness and humour and
+unmistakable sincerity.  He made no direct allusion to anything that had
+passed between them before he left, filling them chiefly with
+descriptions of the free, wild life on an Argentine cattle ranch, but
+there was something in the way he put things, and in the fact of each
+letter being addressed to her, that whispered a secret message to
+Eileen's heart.  She was not ready for the message yet, but when she was
+very lonely it was a soothing thought and she let it linger in her mind
+gladly.  Paddy, meanwhile, with true pertinacity, remained staunch to
+her old chum.  What Jack had been to her he still remained, and seemed
+likely to do at present, to the detriment of any other would-be suitor.
+Paddy felt she liked them all, but not any one more than another, except
+Jack O'Hara.  Poor Ted Masterman only came in for an equal share with
+the rest, though she still continued to wear his coin, and he never
+ceased to think of her, night and day, in his far-off African home.
+Then there were the two O'Connors, to say nothing of Cousin Basil.  At
+first it had been the gallant Captain, who soon found himself in a ripe
+condition to be consoled for the loss of Owen Carew; but he had made no
+headway whatever, not even as much as with the gay society belle, and
+finally had to return to India needing consolation all over again.  Then
+his brother Pat, the Middlesex lady-killer, took a turn, but with still
+less success, for Paddy would not even bother to amuse him, and
+pitilessly summed him up in the same breath with the meek young curate,
+who had meanwhile become hopelessly enamoured of Eileen's lovely face.
+
+Basil, on the whole, she began to rather like, though she still taunted
+and teased him mercilessly; but if he got at all sentimental, as he very
+much wanted to do, he was shut up in such a very summary fashion that it
+was quite an exercise in courage ever to approach the dangerous ground
+at all.
+
+With the doctor's patients she was a great favourite.  Being a poor
+practice, those who could usually fetched their medicines themselves,
+and others sent children; and for one and all Paddy had a cheery
+greeting, or a merry jest, from behind her rows of neatly-wrapped
+bottles.  To a police sergeant, who started airing all his grievances at
+things in general at great length, she once said: "What's the good of
+grumbling; it doesn't really help matters a bit.  Do you know, if I
+stopped to think now, and then tried to express my feelings, I should
+just hurl all these bottles at your head, and anyone else's head who
+happened to come to the surgery."
+
+The sergeant of police was so impressed that he went away quite
+thoughtfully, and the next time he fetched medicine he brought her half
+a score of new-laid eggs from his own fowl run.
+
+"I was thinkin' about you findin' it dull work corkin' up them bottles,"
+he said a little shamefacedly, "and them'll be as good as you got in the
+country, which you can't say of many eggs in London."
+
+But it was one day the following spring, fifteen months after she had
+first come to London, that a chance meeting in Regent street brought
+about the beginning of a great change in Paddy's life.  It was amazing
+how trim, and neat, and smart she had become now; London must certainly
+have been said to suit her, for she had rounded and filled out into a
+charming figure; and, while taking pains with her dress and appearance,
+she still walked with the old light, free step of her country days, her
+head thrown well back and her eyes clear and frank as of old.  Without
+the least effort or wish on her part, wherever she went she was almost
+sure to be noticed, even when with Eileen, who, however, must always
+absorb the lion's share of passing homage.  Mrs Adair was, indeed,
+justly proud of her two girls' increasing charms; while far away, under
+the sunny South American sky, across endless reaches of rolling grass,
+raced Jack--the other part of the Irish trio--likewise developing into a
+fine, strong, deep-hearted specimen of his sex, immeasurably the better
+for his hard work and various hard experiences in the matter of roughing
+it generally.
+
+On that particular spring afternoon, however, it is with a thin-faced,
+clean-shaven man, and a very striking, dark-eyed girl, who passed up
+Regent Street and went into Fuller's to tea, that we have now to do.
+The man was mostly silent, as was his wont; but the girl was chattering
+gayly, now and then drawing a smile to his lips; and from the amount of
+nods she dispensed in different directions it was very evident she knew
+and was known very well.  After they had commenced their tea, the girl
+bethought her of some special kind of cream bun she particularly wanted,
+and her companion must needs go and hunt for it.  While he was gone she
+looked round casually, and was presently enjoying in no small degree a
+lively altercation between two girls seated near as to which should pay
+for their tea.  There was not much question from the beginning as to
+which would win, for the girl who first caught and held the watcher's
+fancy was unmistakably a young person who usually got her own way by
+hook or crook, and in this case she informed her companion of her
+intention in quite as original and outspoken a way as she did most
+things.  Finally, they departed, and the dark-eyed stranger was quite
+sorry to see them go.
+
+When her attendant knight returned with the cream buns in question, his
+usually impassive face wore the faintest suspicion of surprise, but he
+only placed her delicacies before her and said: "There! now you can make
+yourself ill to your heart's content."
+
+"You ought to have been here a minute ago," she said.  "There was such
+an amusing discussion between two girls about which should pay.  I was
+immensely taken with one of them--she wasn't exactly pretty, but she
+looked so jolly, and she just carried everything before her in a most
+entertaining fashion.  She's just the sort of girl I'd fall in love with
+if I were a man.  Did you notice her?  She was paying at the desk while
+you hunted up these cakes."
+
+"I did.  It was Paddy Adair."
+
+"Paddy Adair!" in tones of amazement.  "Was that really Paddy Adair,
+Lawrence?"
+
+"It was."
+
+"Goodness!" and Gwen grew quite contemptuous.  "Why you said she was
+plain and dowdy!"
+
+Lawrence calmly continued his tea.
+
+"So she was the last time I saw her."
+
+"Well, she isn't now, anyway.  I call her quite striking, and she was
+distinctly well dressed."  There was a pause, then she added: "Perhaps
+she's married, and got a man to choose her things for her.  That's one
+thing husbands are sometimes good for; and some of them know a fair
+amount about hair-dressing too."
+
+"No, she's not married," said Lawrence.  "Doreen was talking about them
+only the other day.  They're living in Shepherd's Bush."
+
+"Shepherd's Bush!" echoed Gwendoline.  "How awful, after their country
+home.  But how London has smartened her up, hasn't it?"
+
+"Astonishingly."
+
+"I wish you had come back in time to speak to her," continued Gwen.
+"I'd like to be introduced."
+
+Meanwhile, Paddy walked down to Piccadilly Circus with Ethel Matheson,
+and then hurried back to get her 'bus in Oxford Street.  On the way she
+dashed into a shop and bought some tomatoes, a favourite dish of her
+mother's--true to her nationality, acting on the spur of the moment,
+blissfully regardless of the fact that she could have got the same
+article for half the money at the other end of her 'bus ride.  As she
+hurried past Fuller's Lawrence and Gwendoline came out, the latter
+catching sight of her instantly.
+
+"There's Paddy Adair!" she exclaimed.  "Do stop her."
+
+Lawrence hesitated and in that second Paddy brushed too near a boy with
+a basket, the basket caught against her bag of tomatoes--carried no
+doubt in somewhat careless fashion--the paper split, and out sprawled
+the tomatoes all across the pavement in the midst of the rank and
+fashion of Regent Street.
+
+"Christopher Columbus!" exclaimed Paddy under her breath and blushing
+crimson, but quite unable to help laughing, as she commenced diving for
+her belongings among the feet of the passers-by.  A dark-eyed girl,
+enjoying the scrimmage immensely, rescued one from the gutter, while the
+man with her succeeded in getting three from various directions, and
+when Paddy at last turned to thank them, a lovely colour in her cheeks
+and a bewitching roguishness in her eyes, she found herself face to face
+with Lawrence Blake and his companion, each offering her a tomato.
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY ONE.
+
+PADDY MAKES A NEW FRIEND.
+
+For one moment Paddy was utterly at a loss, and bit her lips in evident
+vexation, while the colour deepened still further in her face.
+
+"How do you do, Paddy?" said Lawrence.  "You seem to be in difficulties
+as usual.  May I introduce you to your other timely helper, Miss
+Grant-Carew?"
+
+Paddy bowed very stiffly, but as Gwen promptly held out her hand, she
+was obliged to take it.  She managed, however, to avoid doing likewise
+with Lawrence.  Gwen pretended not to notice her coldness, and remarked
+laughingly:
+
+"I'm so glad I didn't miss that.  You can't think how funny it looked--
+in Regent Street of all places, too?"
+
+Paddy was constrained to laugh again at the recollection, but she busied
+herself trying to rearrange the tomatoes in a secure fashion, and
+absolutely refused to look at Lawrence.
+
+"I think they will be all right now," she said.  "Thank you so much for
+helping me to pick them up.  I'm in rather a hurry, as I have to be at
+the surgery by half-past five--if you will excuse my running off.
+Good-by!" and in two seconds she was vanishing in the crowd.
+
+Gwen looked at Lawrence drolly.
+
+"She's a good hater," she remarked.  "Gwen isn't used to being put off
+in that summary fashion.  She doesn't like it, Lawrie."
+
+"It's your own fault.  You practically pushed me into the introduction."
+
+"Because I wanted to know her.  It isn't often people don't want to know
+Gwennie.  I don't understand!--me _ne comprenez pas_, Lawrie.  This is
+going to be interesting," she ran on.  "I shall insist upon Doreen
+inviting me to meet her in Cadogan Place."
+
+Paddy meanwhile scrambled on to her 'bus, tomatoes held safely this
+time, and started homeward feeling furious.
+
+"How dare he introduce me!" she mused angrily.  "He knows I hate her.
+How dare he stop me at all in that cool fashion!" calmly ignoring the
+fact that the tomatoes and her own carelessness, not Lawrence, had done
+the stopping.  "How pretty she is!" she went on in the same angry way.
+"She's as pretty as Eileen.  I wouldn't have cared so much if she had
+been plain, I think, but she's just lovely.  Oh, I hate her, I hate
+her--I just hate them both!"
+
+The bottles got rather banged about that evening, and the good doctor
+looked up once or twice from his writing, in his little inner sanctuary,
+and gently marvelled.  Basil happened to be at home, and strolled into
+his father's den, though only with the idea of strolling out again
+through the surgery door upon suitable pretext.  While hovering round
+there was a sudden crash, which made the doctor start somewhat
+violently.  Basil looked amused.
+
+"Rather stormy this evening, eh?" he suggested.  "Perhaps I'd better go
+and help to pick up the pieces," and he strolled out at the other door.
+
+"Is it blowing great guns and glass bottles, to-night?" he asked of
+Paddy, showing himself somewhat gingerly.
+
+Paddy vouchsafed no reply.
+
+"I understand it rained tomatoes in Regent Street this afternoon," he
+went on, nothing daunted.
+
+She could not forbear to smile.
+
+"Who told you so?"
+
+"Pat nearly lost his life trying to scramble off the top of a 'bus in
+time to pick them up for you.  As far as I can make out, when he arrived
+on the scene a gay Lothario and a wonderful Diana were in possession of
+the field, and he thought well to decamp, and nearly broke his neck over
+again boarding another 'bus, with his eyes occupied in the wrong
+direction."
+
+"Tell Mr O'Connor he shouldn't tell tales out of school."
+
+"Is it the tomato incident that is making you cross?"
+
+"I'm not cross."
+
+"Well, of course I can't contradict you, but, like the parrot, I can
+still think a lot."
+
+"I shouldn't if I were you.  The unusual strain may hurt your brain."
+
+"Whew--as bad as all that, is it?  No letter from Africa this mail, I
+suppose?"
+
+Paddy preserved a contemptuous silence.
+
+"Too bad," said Basil.
+
+"What's too bad?" said Paddy.  "Your last attempt at a joke?"
+
+"The pater's getting anxious." he went on without heading her.  "He's
+sitting in there," nodding toward the surgery, "strung up to an awful
+pitch of nervousness lest you should be blind with--er--well, we'll call
+it annoyance, and poison someone by accident."
+
+"Go away," said Paddy.
+
+"I've nowhere to go."
+
+"Go and look for a picture book to keep you quiet."
+
+"Don't be a silly kid, Paddy," persuasively.  "What's the matter?  I've
+a strong right arm you can command as you wish.  Do you want someone
+hit?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Well, let, me help anyway.  I'll wrap up the bottles for you."
+
+She demurred, but he finally ensconced himself on a high stool beside
+her and presently talked her into a better humour, afterward going home
+with her, which was really rather kind of him after the manner of his
+reception.
+
+Three days later, Paddy received a most affectionate letter from Doreen
+Blake, begging her to come to tea, as she was quite alone.
+
+"Mother and Kathleen are slaying in Eastbourne," she wrote, "as Kathleen
+has been ill, and I had to remain in London because I had accepted so
+many invitations.  Miss Wells is here to look after the house, but you
+and I can have a long, cosy chat all to ourselves.  If you don't come I
+shall be dreadfully disappointed and hurt.  I want to hear all about the
+dispensing and everything."
+
+As Doreen had always been Paddy's special chum, there was nothing
+unusual in Eileen being left out of the invitation, but Paddy tried to
+make it an excuse not to go.  Her mother would not hear of it, however.
+
+"I want you to go, dear," she said, "because I like Mrs Blake and
+Doreen and Kathleen very much, and if they are going to remain in town
+for the season it will be nice for you to go and see them sometimes
+while Eileen and I are away."
+
+It had been arranged that they two should go to Omeath and stay at the
+Parsonage for three months, leaving Paddy at the doctor's, and later on
+Paddy was to join them for her summer holiday, and Mrs Adair and Eileen
+to come back.  This arrangement had been made owing to Eileen's
+ill-health and the doctor's advice that they should not remain in London
+all the summer, and as there was barely room for three visitors together
+at the Parsonage, they decided to go in detachments.
+
+In the end Paddy gave in and accepted the invitation, and at half-past
+three on the appointed day presented herself at the Blakes' house in
+Cadogan Place.  A butler ushered her in, in a lordly fashion, which
+Paddy afterward mimicked much to Eileen's and her mother's amusement,
+and she presently found herself alone in an enormous drawing-room, which
+seemed to her just a conglomeration of fantastic chairs and
+looking-glasses.  A few seconds later there was a swish-swish outside
+and Doreen appeared.  For one second the girls looked at each other with
+the unspoken question, "Are you changed?" and then with little
+exclamations of delight they literally flew at each other.
+
+"Paddy, this is just lovely!" exclaimed Doreen when they had finished
+embracing.  "I've been longing to see you for months."
+
+"Silk linings!" said Paddy, walking round Doreen quizzically.  "We are
+grand nowadays!  If there's one thing I want more than another, it's to
+go swish-swish as I walk."
+
+"Nonsense!" said Doreen.  "I know better.  You don't care a fig about
+it, and neither do I for the matter of that.  It's as much Lawrence's
+fad as anyone's.  When Kathleen and I go out with him he likes us to be
+lined with silk," and she laughed merrily, adding, "But what a swell you
+are, Paddy, and how pretty you have grown!"
+
+"It's only my hair," answered Paddy.  "I spend ten minutes on it now
+instead of two.  It's awfully jolly to find you just the same, Doreen.
+What a heap we've got to tell each other.  Are we going to say in this
+`throne-room' or what?"
+
+"Don't you like it?  We can sit on the rug by the fire, and no one will
+come.  I told James to say `not at home.'"
+
+"Is James the overpowering individual who condescended to show me
+upstairs?  I nearly said `Thank you, sir!' by mistake."
+
+Doreen pulled up two big cosy chairs, and they were soon talking
+nineteen to the dozen, or rather Paddy twenty to Doreen's ten, with such
+vigour, that neither of than heard the door open and a light footstep
+enter.  At the sound of a bracelet jingling, however, they looked round
+in surprise, to find Gwendoline, resplendent in a lovely new spring
+costume, standing watching them with laughter in her glorious eyes.
+
+"I knew you would be `not at home,' Doreen," she said, "so I just made
+Lawrence lend me his latchkey.  Don't be vexed.  I'm sick of private
+views, and spring shows and things, and I just wanted awfully to come
+and see you and Miss Adair."
+
+Doreen sprang up and made room for her eagerly, not noticing Paddy's
+sudden stiffness.
+
+"Come along," she exclaimed, "I'm delighted to see you.  I know you and
+Paddy will get on first-rate."
+
+Gwen held out her hand to Paddy and looked frankly into her face, as
+much as to say, "I know you hate me, but I mean to change all that," and
+Paddy, slightly disarmed, shook hands and said, "How do you do," with a
+little less starchiness.
+
+For ten minutes, results hung in the balance.  Gwen was at her best; she
+was indeed most charming; but Paddy was obstinate, not to say somewhat
+pig-headed, and when she was in that mood, to quote Basil, you might
+almost as well try to persuade a lamp-post to walk across the road.
+
+But Basil was not Gwen, and if he had tried for a life-time, he could
+not have cultivated such powers of persuasion as hers and in this she
+meant to win.  Paddy would have needed to be made of adamant to
+withstand her.  In the end, of course, she gave in, and by the time the
+stately butler condescended to serve them with tea, a merrier trio it
+would have been difficult to find.
+
+Lawrence heard their gay laughter down in the hall, as he hung up his
+hat, and smiled a little grimly.
+
+"Gwen's won," he said to himself.  "I wonder what sort of a reception I
+shall get?"
+
+He walked slowly upstairs, and as slowly entered the drawing-room.
+Paddy was entertaining the other two with some of her dispensing
+adventures and for a moment he remained unnoticed.  Paddy saw him first.
+
+"I was reaching to a high shelf--" she was saying, and then she stopped
+short suddenly, with her eyes on the door.
+
+The other two looked round quickly, as Lawrence advanced, saying, "Yes,
+you were reaching to a high shelf, and--"
+
+"Nothing," said Paddy, "or at least nothing that would interest you."
+
+"Try me."
+
+"Come along, Lawrie," cried Gwen.  "We're having a regular, jolly old
+school-girl afternoon.  You'll find it an education gratis, and you can
+eat as much cake as you like.  We are all eating as if we had never ate
+before, to make up for the times we went hungry at school."
+
+Lawrence sat down by Doreen, opposite to Paddy.
+
+"Delighted," he murmured.  "Always thought the _role_ of school-girl
+would suit me down to the ground.  Touching this high shelf--don't let
+me interrupt you, Paddy."
+
+Paddy looked furious and got scarlet in the face.  She was determined
+she _would not_ be friendly with Lawrence, and yet here she was, almost
+on intimate terms with his _fiancee_, and fairly caught as regards
+himself.
+
+Gwen dropped her long lashes to hide a decided gleam of amusement, while
+Doreen, pouring out tea and noticing nothing, said, "Go on, Paddy, you
+needn't mind Lawrence."
+
+"Of course not," he said, keeping his eyes fixed on her.  "Why should
+she?"
+
+Still Paddy bit her lip and hesitated.  "It's time I was going," she
+said at last, very lamely, looking around for her gloves.
+
+Gwen's mouth twitched desperately at the corners and Doreen looked up in
+surprise.  Doreen's expression made Paddy pull herself together.
+
+"It wasn't really anything worth telling," she said, "only that, instead
+of standing on something to make myself taller as I ought to have done,
+I tried to tilt the jar over into my hand, and while doing so the
+stopper flew out.  The jar was full of black powder, and before I could
+help myself I had most of it in my face and over my hair.  You never saw
+anything so awful as I looked.  Brushing it off left long black streaks
+in all directions, and the taste on my lips was filthy; the three people
+waiting for their medicine nearly had convulsions, and the doctor came
+out to see what was the matter."
+
+"Oh, how delicious!" cried Gwen in enjoyment.  "Whatever did he say?"
+while Doreen, laughing heartily, gasped:
+
+"Oh, Paddy, you must have looked piebald!"
+
+"Goodness only knows what I did look like," she said.  "I thought the
+doctor was going to faint.  I tried to explain, but I was laughing so
+myself, and meanwhile getting such horrid tastes of the wretched stuff,
+that I couldn't frame a sensible sentence.  Finally, he grasped the
+situation for himself, and stayed to get on with the dispensing, while I
+went to try and get my face clean."  While they were still laughing, she
+got up to go.
+
+"I'm coming to call on you if I may?" said Gwen as they shook hands.
+
+Paddy looked doubtful.
+
+"It's rather an awful place to come to," she explained, "the ugliest
+part of Shepherd's Bush.  You'd never find it."
+
+"Oh, yes, I will.  I'll have a taxi, and refuse to get out until he
+stops at your door.  He'll find it after a time."
+
+"I'm only a visitor at my uncle's now, though," she continued in the
+same doubtful voice, "and--well, to tell you the honest truth, my aunt
+is rather tedious.  She's quite sure to help me entertain you, and
+she'll give you a detailed history of every church work in the parish,
+from its earliest infancy."
+
+"I know!" cried Gwen with a sudden idea.  "We'll go to the surgery,
+Doreen.  We'll hunt up some old prescriptions, and pretend we're poor
+people come for medicine.  Yes, that will be much better fun!  I've
+never seen a dispensary, and I'd love to poke about in all the drawers
+and bottles," to which Doreen agreed readily and Paddy turned, to the
+door.
+
+Lawrence followed her.
+
+"Shall I get my head bitten off if I venture to escort you to the hall?"
+he asked, so that she alone could hear.
+
+"I would not trouble you for the world," she replied frigidly, and
+offered her hand.
+
+Lawrence looked into her eyes, and something like a flash of sword-play
+passed between them.
+
+"All the same," he remarked, coolly, "I am going to send you home in a
+hansom, and see you into it myself."
+
+Paddy saw it was useless to object there and did not want to make a
+scene, so went stiffly downstairs.  In the hall the lordly James stood
+waiting.
+
+"Call a hansom," said Lawrence briefly.
+
+"Not for me," said Paddy, with her nose in the air.  "I am going in a
+'bus."
+
+"But it is raining fast, and you will only get wet."  Lawrence spoke a
+little urgently, while the butler waited with impassive face.
+
+"I love getting wet," icily.
+
+The faintest suspicion of a smile hovered over Lawrence's lips, but he
+only turned to the butler and said, "Go and ask Miss Doreen's maid for a
+cloak and umbrella."
+
+Paddy was unpleasantly aware that she could not afford to risk getting
+her one smart costume spoiled, so she yielded with a bad grace.
+
+When they were alone he turned to her again, and his thin lips
+compressed into a straight line.
+
+"I see you are a good hater," he said, "but I only like you the better
+for it.  Do you remember--I said you had given me a new interest in
+life, and that I would subdue you some day?  I am going to begin now."
+
+"And I replied that I despised you.  I have seen no reason to change my
+mind.  It is not of the least consequence to me what you do."
+
+There was a gleam in his eyes that might have meant either admiration or
+war, but Paddy, a moment later, only flung out of the house without
+deigning him so much as a glance.
+
+When she had gone, Lawrence did not return to the drawing-room.  He went
+into his den and closed the door.  On the hearthrug he stood looking
+silently at the floor.
+
+"By Jove," he muttered a last, "who would have thought she would develop
+like this.  Paddy-the-next-best-thing," with a little smile, "has become
+Patricia-the-Great."
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY TWO.
+
+PADDY LEARNS HER MISTAKE.
+
+True to her word, Gwen called for Doreen a few days later, and the two
+drove in a taxi to Shepherd's Bush and found their way to the surgery,
+where Paddy, in a large black apron, was busy with her prescriptions.
+They stayed about ten minutes and then drove away again, leaving Paddy
+less able than ever to resist Gwen's overtures.  At the same time, she
+felt no less incensed against Lawrence and anxious to avoid meeting him,
+which was the cause of her reluctance to accept an invitation to a small
+dance at Gwen's beautiful home in Grosvenor Place.
+
+"I have no dress good enough," she told Doreen when they talked it over,
+"and I can't afford to get a new one on purpose."
+
+"Nonsense," asserted Doreen promptly.  "I know quite well you have.
+Why, that pretty dress you had for our coming-out dance is not two years
+old, and you have scarcely worn it at all.  You must just send it to me,
+and I will get Jean to do it up for you.  You simply must come.  It will
+be such a jolly dance.  Not a grand one at all, but one of Gwen's
+impromptu hops, as she calls them."
+
+In the end Paddy gave in, and on the evening of the dance arrived at
+Cadogan Place in time to go with Doreen and Lawrence in their brougham.
+She knew Lawrence would be there, but was prepared for it, and chatted
+merrily to Doreen without ever including him if she could help it.
+
+Lawrence took no notice, merely sitting forward, opposite to them, with
+his arms across his knees, casually glancing through an evening paper.
+
+When Paddy first arrived Doreen had made her take off her cloak and show
+herself, and he had then, as she well knew, though he said nothing,
+criticised her keenly.  Doreen had been enraptured.
+
+"You look splendid!" was her verdict.  "I don't know what it is about
+you, Paddy, but somehow you always manage to look striking nowadays.
+Don't you think so, Lawrence?  Here am I, got up at endless expense,
+mentioned in the fashionable papers as `pretty Miss Doreen Blake,' and
+yet, when we go into the room together, I'm sure everyone will look at
+you."
+
+"If they do, it will only be my hair," laughed Paddy.  "It's so
+difficult not to stare at carroty hair."
+
+"Stuff!" from Doreen.  "But am I not right, Lawrence?"
+
+Lawrence was standing a little apart, lighting a cigarette, and he did
+not answer for a moment.
+
+"Paddy has a lot of original ideas," he said at last, "and they somehow
+cling about her.  The crowd is always struck with anything original."
+
+Paddy was pulling on a long glove.  "I guess I'll have this stocking in
+half before I've done," she remarked, with studied unconcern, "and then
+I shall have to pin it to my sleeve to show I possess it, which is,
+after all, the main thing about it."
+
+When they reached the Hon.  Grant-Carew's, however, and had got rid of
+their cloaks, Lawrence came up to them while chatting with Gwen and
+asked Paddy how many dances she would give him.
+
+Paddy tried to prevaricate, but both Gwen and Doreen were watching, and
+Lawrence persisted.  He had purposely chosen that moment, knowing she
+could hardly refuse before the other two.
+
+"Give him three," said Gwen decisively.  "I'll allow that number, as
+he's a lovely waltzer, and you're sure to enjoy them; but the rest of
+your programme I'm going to superintend myself and see that you don't
+get any tiresome partners at all."
+
+Paddy bit her lip and flashed a look at Lawrence that seemed to dare him
+to take advantage of her position.  He, however, only smiled slightly
+with his usual impassivity, and wrote her name three times upon his
+programme.  He then glanced at Gwen significantly, and she, in an easy,
+natural fashion, possessed herself of Paddy's programme and handed it to
+him.
+
+Paddy was inwardly furious, but obliged to take it with a good grace.
+When they had their first dance, however, she hardly spoke, and
+afterward insisted upon remaining in the dance-room, so that she could
+watch the other guests instead of keeping up a conversation.  Lawrence
+pretended not to notice, but chatted pleasantly about the people and
+pointed out any one of note to her.  The same thing happened at each of
+his dances, and whereas Paddy was brilliant with enjoyment with all her
+other partners, she immediately became constrained and silent with him.
+And each time Lawrence chatted in his pleasantest way, and pretended not
+to notice it.
+
+Later, however, he suddenly dropped his pretence, and took the bull by
+the horns in his most resolute fashion.  It had been arranged that Paddy
+should return home in a hansom straight from Grosvenor Place, and after
+saying good-by to Doreen she turned and nodded a casual good-by to
+Lawrence, standing near.
+
+"I am coming with you," he said calmly.
+
+"Oh, no, certainly not," and Paddy looked very resolute.  "There is not
+the least necessity to drag you all that way.  Besides, you must see
+Doreen home."
+
+"Doreen will go home in the brougham.  I am coming with you."
+
+For one moment there was a dangerous look in Paddy's eyes; then Doreen
+chimed in with:
+
+"Don't be silly, Paddy.  Of course Lawrie will take you home.  As if he
+were likely to do otherwise."
+
+Paddy saw there was no help for it, and tripped down the steps and into
+the hansom without giving him a chance to offer his hand.  Lawrence gave
+the address and stepped in after her.
+
+"Do you mind my cigarette?" he asked, to which Paddy replied coldly,
+"Not in the least," and drew further back into her corner.
+
+"You seem more angry with me than ever to-night," he began presently.
+
+By this time Paddy had just about exhausted her none too large supply of
+cold hauteur, so, feeling she must vent her anger somehow, she turned
+upon him suddenly, which secretly pleased Lawrence because it was so
+much more natural to her.
+
+"Of course I am angry with you," she exclaimed.  "I think you have
+behaved abominably.  You have simply laid traps for me, first over the
+dances and then over this drive.  You know perfectly well I would have
+refused both if Doreen and Miss Carew had not been with us."
+
+"That was strategy.  They say all is fair in love and war."
+
+"I don't care what they say; you are a paltry enemy, because you take a
+mean advantage."
+
+"And supposing I weren't an enemy at all?"
+
+"But you are; you can't help being.  You only did it purely and simply
+to annoy me.  You knew I did not want to dance with you, so you thought
+you would make me, just for an amusement for yourself--because it's a
+new experience to have an unwilling partner, or something equally silly.
+It was only on a par with most of your actions."
+
+Lawrence slowly knocked some ash off his cigarette.
+
+"I can't understand Miss Carew helping you," Paddy ran on.  "If she is
+going to marry you, it is no reason why she should encourage you in
+annoying other people."
+
+Lawrence raised his eyebrows slightly.
+
+"What makes you think Miss Carew is going to marry me?" he asked.
+
+"Well, when people are engaged to each other, don't they usually marry!"
+
+There was a faint gleam of amusement in his eyes, but he managed to hide
+it by studying the end of his cigarette.
+
+"And what makes you think Miss Carew and I are engaged to each other?"
+
+Paddy shook herself with an irritable movement.
+
+"Because you are, of course!  I have known it a long time."
+
+"Longer than we have, I suspect," with provoking calmness.
+
+Paddy puckered her forehead into a frown, and condescended to look at
+him.
+
+"Of course, I don't know whether it is announced or not yet, and I'm
+sure I don't care, but I heard from a mutual friend of yours and hers
+that it was settled when you were in India over a year ago."
+
+"Might I ask you the mutual friend's name?"
+
+"It was Captain O'Connor.  He met you both in Calcutta.  But really,
+except that I like Miss Carew very much, this is a most uninteresting
+topic."
+
+"On the contrary, considering we have never been engaged at all, and it
+is very unlikely that we ever shall be, I find it extremely
+interesting."
+
+"Never been engaged at all!" gasped Paddy.
+
+"Never to my knowledge," with the same provoking calmness.
+
+"Impossible!  Captain O'Connor told me he had congratulated you both,
+and that he heard it from Miss Carew herself."
+
+A sudden light broke on Lawrence.  "Did he tell you it happened a year
+last Christmas?" he asked.
+
+"About then.  He was passing through Calcutta on his way home."
+
+"Ah!" significantly.
+
+"Then you were engaged," scathingly, "and with your customary
+changeableness have broken it off again?"
+
+"Yes, that's about it.  But this was a record in quick changes."
+
+"Why?--how?" irritably, feeling there was something she did not
+understand.
+
+"Merely that it only lasted one evening."
+
+"One evening!" incredulously.
+
+"Yes.  But, of course, you do not care to hear about it.  I quite
+understand that my affairs in any shape or form are not of the slightest
+interest to you," which was quite a long sentence for Lawrence.
+
+For a few minutes Paddy felt squashed; then her curiosity got the better
+of her.
+
+"Did Miss Carew do it?" she asked.
+
+"She did.  She asked me to be her tool for one evening, having got into
+a scrape with a hot-headed Irishman and a woolly-lamb Englishman.
+Since, almost as long as I can remember, I have been at Gwendoline's
+beck and call, I was perfectly willing.  I presume the hot-headed
+Irishman was your friend Captain O'Connor."
+
+For some minutes Paddy was struck dumb.  It had never entered her head
+to question the engagement, and she had not mentioned it to Doreen
+because it was such a sore subject.  Hastily reviewing the past year,
+however, she could not but see that, on the whole, the news, though
+incorrect, had been most beneficial to Eileen.  Undoubtedly, from the
+time she learnt of Lawrence's supposed engagement, she had been better
+able to pull herself together and set steadily about forgetting him.
+Only this could not, to a girl like Paddy, in any measure abate what had
+gone.  For every tear Lawrence's heartlessness had made her sister shed,
+she felt she had an undying grudge against him, and she would not
+forget.  Presently, to break the silence, she remarked:
+
+"I don't know how you can help falling in love with Miss Carew.  Why
+aren't you engaged to her?"
+
+"Well, one very good reason, perhaps, is the fact that she is
+practically engaged to someone else."
+
+"Is she?" with ill-concealed eagerness.  "Who is he!"
+
+"Unfortunately he happens to be a younger son, which is a heinous and
+not easily-overcome offence in her mother's eyes, and hence the delay."
+
+"What a pity!  Is he nice?"
+
+"One of the nicest chaps I ever met."
+
+"Oh, I do hope it will come out right in the end."
+
+"There is not much doubt.  Gwen has her father on her side, and I think
+it is chiefly a question of time with the mother.  But, for the matter
+of that, Gwen always gets her own way in the end.  Her mother arranged
+for her to be a countess eighteen months ago, but at the last moment she
+advised the earl not to propose to her, and sent him flying."
+
+"How splendid of her!" cried Paddy, forgetting her anger for a moment.
+"And she is going to marry a plain Mr Somebody now?"
+
+"Well, he holds a captain's commission in the Guards, and considerably
+distinguished himself in South Africa.  I'm not sure it wasn't his V.C.
+that took Gwen's fancy first."
+
+"How nice!  I do like her so much.  I hope she'll be able to marry him
+soon and be awfully happy.  Do you think I might mention it to her?"
+
+"I'm surprised she hasn't already told you herself.  She is not in the
+least reserved about it, and she is awfully in love with him.  She is as
+good at loving as you are at hating, Paddy," and suddenly he was looking
+into her eyes, with an expression she had never seen on his face before,
+and which stirred her pulses unaccountably.  She fidgeted with her
+hands, compressed her lips, and stared straight before her, feeling in
+every corner of her being that he was still looking at her with those
+calm, compelling eyes.
+
+"Well!" he asked at last, and his voice was full of that winning quality
+which had gained him such easy conquests in the past.  But it only made
+Paddy hotly distrustful, and she gripped the front of the hansom and
+called up every fighting instinct she possessed.
+
+"Miss Carew would hate in my place."  She drew a long breath, as if
+gathering herself together for a special thrust.  "Since she loves as
+strongly as I hate, I am glad it is some one else, and not you, to whom
+she has given her love."  She was unconsciously sitting rigidly upright,
+and from his corner, with his compelling eyes still watching her face,
+that gleam that might have been either love or war again passed through
+them.
+
+"You hit hard," he said at last; and then, with the slightest inflection
+of a taunt in his voice, added: "Why don't you look at me--are you
+afraid?"
+
+Paddy bit her teeth together hard, and her breath came a little
+fitfully.  She was not afraid--that was quite certain; but, on the other
+hand, she had not quite the calm assurance she usually felt.  She would
+greatly have preferred not to look at him.
+
+"Well?" he said again.
+
+Paddy took her courage in both hands.
+
+"No, I am not afraid," and she turned her head a moment and looked full
+and deep into his eyes.
+
+Suddenly he gave a low, harsh laugh.
+
+"My God!" he muttered.  "Patricia the Great!"  And then he flung his
+half-smoked cigarette away and stared into the night.
+
+Neither spoke again, and a few minutes later the cab drew up at her
+uncle's door.  He sprang out first and offered her his aid, but she
+gathered up her dress with both hands and ignored him.  At the door she
+fitted the latchkey into the lock herself.  While she fumbled a little
+in the dim light, she felt his eyes again fixed on her, and before she
+managed to get the door open he said, in low, distinct tones, "The new
+interest you have given me is growing apace, Patricia.  I see it is
+going to be war to the knife, but, if I'm worth my name, I'll win yet."
+
+"Good-night," she said jauntily, as the door at last opened, then
+slammed it in his face.
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY THREE.
+
+PATRICIA THE GREAT.
+
+It would be difficult to say when the awakening first came to Lawrence.
+Before it came he felt it growing every day.  After it came, it seemed
+to have been there all along.  At first he blinded himself with the
+belief that he was only piqued.  That it would on the whole be
+entertaining to break down her defences and subdue her.  He was grateful
+to her for giving him even that much new interest in life.
+
+Afterward he faced the situation with entire honesty.  He admitted
+frankly to himself that he loved her, and he knew, without going any
+further, that it was the love of his life.  All the past peccadilloes,
+entanglements, fancies, were nothing--were mere episodes--nothing seemed
+real any longer except that he loved Paddy Adair.  He, the graceful
+_dilettante_, the highly eligible society man, the casual, cynical
+scholar--she, the harum-scarum tom-boy, the fearless Irish
+romp--"Paddy-the-next-best-thing."
+
+When the awakening had come, and he faced the facts squarely, he
+believed he had loved her ever since the night of the Omeath dance,
+when, in his den, she had flung defiance at him, and marched off with
+her head in the air, in lofty disdain.
+
+He reviewed what had transpired between them since, and; his thoughts
+were gloomy enough.  Most emphatically the defiance and the disdain were
+still the dominant notes she was at no further pains now, than then, to
+hide her contempt.  He knew that since the night of Gwen's dance she had
+resorted to strategy to avoid him.  Since his mother and Kathleen
+returned home there had been much sight-seeing and entertaining, and
+Paddy was continually requisitioned.  Yet she contrived to turn up on
+the occasions when he had another engagement, and remain absent when he
+made a victim of himself for the express purpose of seeing her.  Even at
+a second dance she had outwitted him.
+
+"Lawrence will take you home," Doreen had said in his presence, and
+Paddy had politely replied: "Thank you."  Yet when he sought her neat
+the end of the evening, it was to find she had already gone--undoubtedly
+missing two dances rather than accept his escort.
+
+The third time, however, he was one too many for her.  He watched from a
+safe vantage ground until he saw her give a quiet glance round, and then
+surreptitiously slip away.  Instantly he accosted Doreen.
+
+"It is raining in torrents," he told her, "and I don't want the horses
+to wait to-night.  I shall go home now, and send a taxi for you and
+Kathleen at one o'clock."
+
+Doreen thought it a little odd, but was immediately claimed by a
+partner, and Lawrence gave her no time to reply.
+
+When Paddy slipped cautiously out of the cloak-room and made for the
+door, she stopped short before a coated figure unmistakably waiting for
+her, and said: "Oh!"
+
+"I'm going to take you home in the carriage," said Lawrence, with a
+resolution against which she felt powerless.  "I've arranged with the
+others to be fetched in a taxi."
+
+Paddy flashed defiance at him, bit her teeth together, and descended the
+steps with the air of an outraged princess.  Lawrence reflected that it
+was a long way to Shepherd's Bush, and smiled grimly to himself--partly
+at the feelings of his coachman, and partly at the success of his ruse.
+
+So they bowled along in a comfortable brougham, though Paddy disdained
+the padded cushions, and sat bolt upright like a terrier on guard.
+Lawrence sat back in his corner and watched her, feeling for the moment
+almost content.  It was something, at least, to have captured her for a
+few minutes and have her all to himself.  Her skirts brushed against his
+foot, her flowers exhaled a delicate perfume in the carriage, her cloak,
+falling open, slipped back a little on to his knee.  Lawrence had
+reached the stage when a man is thankful for very small mercies, and he
+was vaguely thankful for these.
+
+"Am I permitted to express an old friend's congratulations on your
+appearance?" he asked presently, in a voice that held no mockery.
+
+"When I am with you I seem to do nothing but repeat myself," was the
+crushing reply.  "How often am I to tell you that what you do, say, or
+think, is not of the smallest consequence to me."
+
+"You could not please me better than by repeating yourself," a little
+whimsically.  She stared in front of her.
+
+"Can any one come to your surgery for medicine?" presently.  "If I came
+with an ill, would you try to administer healing to me?"
+
+"I should try to administer a rebuff that would prevent your ever coming
+again."
+
+He smiled a little.  "You couldn't hit harder than you have; and yet I
+still come."
+
+"That is your colossal obstinacy.  Nothing in your life has ever
+attracted you except the unattainable.  I understand perfectly, that
+because I happen to have the hardihood to withstand your overtures, and
+the originality," with finely toned satire, "to prefer your room to your
+company, it amuses you to thrust your attentions upon me, just to see
+how soon I shall give in and bow down with the rest.  You may save
+yourself the trouble.  I shall never give in.  It is only because of
+your mother and sisters that I assume any degree of friendliness
+whatever."
+
+"And what if I say I will never give in either?  I am a strong man,
+Paddy, when I make up my mind about anything."
+
+"You are nothing of the kind.  You are a coward, or you would not
+persist in taking unfair advantages of me."
+
+He flushed, but refused to get angry.
+
+"I have taken no unfair advantage to-night.  Only yesterday you accepted
+my escort before Doreen."
+
+"Only because I was cornered, and you knew it."
+
+He was silent for a space, then returned to the charge.
+
+"Why won't you cry a truce, Paddy?" and his voice was strangely winsome.
+"No one is hurt now, and you cannot choose but feel in your heart that
+it was a good thing I went away in time."
+
+To any one less unsophisticated than Paddy, less direct in all her
+thoughts and actions, less fearlessly independent, such a tone of voice
+must have been dangerously alluring--coming, moreover, from such as he,
+with all his advantages, to such as she with all her losses.  But Paddy
+was a soldier to the backbone.  Having thrown down the glove and entered
+the combat, she would give and take no quarter.  Personal gain was
+nothing--personal loss still less--Lawrence was the enemy--the enemy she
+had declared war against, and until the conduct that had so infuriated
+her was amply atoned for, she would not only stick to her guns, but was
+of the stuff to die uselessly beside them for a lost cause.  She was her
+father over again at the sternest moments of his brilliant career.  No
+parleying with the enemy--War.  The old charm for once fell on heedless
+ears.  She continued to look rigidly out into the night, with her face
+averted, and did not even condescend to reply.
+
+She was thinking with no small satisfaction that he would no doubt soon
+be leaving London for a long time.  Already arrangements were in
+progress for Mrs Blake and the girls to go to Mourne Lodge, and it was
+not in the least likely that Lawrence would accompany them.  At any time
+he had only gone under protest, and that very evening Doreen had
+expressed curiosity as to where he would go when they departed.  The
+thought that she would probably not see him again for months after
+to-night, further gladdened and fortified her.
+
+When he spoke again she was ready for him.
+
+"Well?" he asked, in that most beguiling of voices.  "Is it to be a
+truce, Paddy--for the sake of the old days!"
+
+She stared straight before her.
+
+"It is only when the old days cease to exist there can be a truce
+between you and me," in measured tones.  "On account of the old days,
+and because they will live to our last gasp, I shall never again be your
+friend."
+
+Then a surprising thing happened--a thing that took her breath away, and
+left her speechless.  Suddenly, from leaning back in his corner, he
+started up, and bent forward, and seized both her hands in his in a grip
+of iron.
+
+"I don't want you to be my friend!" he exclaimed, almost roughly.  "Good
+God! as if I should put myself out, and go to the lengths I have, just
+to gain a friend!"  He gave a little harsh laugh.  "A friend, indeed!--
+no, I don't want your friendship, listen, Paddy--" the hands gripping
+hers tightened, and she saw in the dim light that he was very white, and
+his eyes gleamed strangely, and masterful resolve filled his face.  "It
+is a _wife_ I want--not a friend--and a _wife_ I mean to have.  This
+feud is nonsense.  It is mere obstinacy now.  If I behaved wrongly to
+Eileen I am sorry.  I can't say any more, and you can see for yourself
+it was a good thing we never got engaged.  Are you going to let an
+ancient thing like that come between us--punish two people for a third
+one who is unhurt?  I say `two,' because I know I could make you happy,
+if you would drop this--this--prejudice, and be your old self again."
+
+While he was speaking Paddy herself turned very pale and for a moment
+there was a bewildered expression in her eyes, as she continued to gaze
+fixedly before her.  Then once again she rallied her forces for a final
+blow.  She wrenched her hands from his and faced him squarely.
+
+"You must be mad!" she said.  "You can't know what you are talking
+about.  How many times am I to tell you that I hate you?--Listen! hate
+you--_hate_ you.  I do not know what you mean by a prejudice.  I know
+that you dared to trifle with one of my house--I know that you nearly
+broke my sister's heart--I know that you are heartless, and cruel, and
+selfish--and then you talk to me of love and marriage,"--she paused for
+very indignation.
+
+"Yes, I do," he interrupted decisively, "and I shall again, in spite of
+your kind summing up."
+
+"Then thank goodness you are going away, and, at least, we shall not
+meet any more for a long time!"
+
+"Who told you I was going away!"
+
+"Don't you always go away in the summer?--and besides the others are
+leaving for Mourne Lodge directly."
+
+"And what if they are?"
+
+"You must go somewhere."
+
+"Certainly.  I am going to Mourne Lodge with them."
+
+Paddy was momentarily staggered, then she peered out of the window at
+the street.  "We are just arriving," she said, "I can let myself in.
+You need not get out in the rain."
+
+He only gave a low laugh, and took the latchkey out of her hand.
+
+As he opened the door, he looked once more hard into her eyes:
+
+"Good-night, Patricia the Great.  We shall meet again at Omeath."
+
+Paddy went upstairs feeling a little dazed, and then commenced throwing
+things about to relieve her feelings.
+
+"How he dare!--how he dare--!" a slipper crashed into the fireplace.
+"Anything for novelty.  I suppose he thinks he will amuse himself with
+me next!  He talks as if he imagines I am merely playing--as if a little
+coaxing and cajolery--he's--he's--bother these tangles!" and the
+beautiful hair began to suffer badly from its owner's perturbed frame of
+mind.  "But he'll soon find he's mistaken,"--the hairbrush missed the
+window by half-an-inch, and fell into the water-jug: "Oh! if only I were
+a man and could fight him!--But I'm a Dublin Fusilier General's
+daughter--and I ought to know something about fighting!"  Over went a
+chair backward, bringing down a small table laden with photo frames.
+"I'll be even with him yet--the sweep!" with which she dived under the
+bedclothes, as if she were a whole regiment of Fusiliers storming a
+position.
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR.
+
+ROBERT MORONY ON CHURCH RESTORATION.
+
+It was not until the second week in August that Paddy was able to start
+on her summer holiday, and then she journeyed to Omeath to pay her
+long-counted-on visit to the Parsonage.
+
+Eileen and her mother and the two aunties were all at the little station
+awaiting her, when the train drew up soon after seven in the morning,
+and, like some small terrier beside itself with excitement, Paddy almost
+fell headlong, upon the top of them all.  From the very instant she
+caught sight of her old friend the giant on Carlingford Mountain she
+threw off all cares, all recollections of London, all responsibilities,
+and stepped into the Omeath train almost the identical, headstrong,
+happy-go-lucky Paddy of eighteen months ago.  Such a hand-shaking there
+had been at Greenore, for she knew all the railway porters and the
+station officials and everyone connected with the hotel, and, judging
+from the greetings, they were as pleased to see her as she them.  At
+Omeath the others began to wonder what time they would manage to get her
+as far as the Parsonage, for every man, woman, and child had to be
+talked to and shaken hands with.
+
+There was a great spread for breakfast--everything that they knew she
+liked best and poor Paddy had to taste something of each dish to please
+them, until she was obliged to impress them politely that she had
+reached the utmost limit of her capacity.  After breakfast she and
+Eileen went off on an exploring expedition through the village.  At the
+church gate they met the sexton, old Robert Morony, a sort of monument
+of longevity to the village.
+
+"I've been to see the restorations, Robert," cried Paddy joyously.
+"Doesn't the church look lovely!"
+
+"It do, indaid, Miss Paddy," answered the old man, shaking hands with
+unmistakable pleasure.  "Faith! did ye iver see sich a luvely place o'
+warship afore?  An' everythin' so compact lik'!  What I mean, nothin'
+stunted."
+
+"I should think not, Robert.  Trust Aunt Jane and Aunt Mary to do a
+thing thoroughly if they undertake it.  When I heard the church was to
+be restored by them, I said, `Begorra! that'll be an edifice to be proud
+of now!'"
+
+Robert chuckled with delight.
+
+"But shure, an' you don't see the half," he explained eagerly.  "It's
+all them nice things you don't see as so pleases me.  Now would you
+belaive--there's actually twelve new dusters! positively bran' new, all
+folded as neat an' trim-lik' an' put away where no one can see 'em.  Now
+that's what I call restoring a church properly--indaid, I just luve the
+sight of 'em."
+
+"I quite agree with you, Robert," and Paddy's eyes twinkled rarely.
+"It's the things I can't see, that I love to look at."
+
+"Egzactly," with growing excitement.  "_I_ ought to 'a' showed you
+roun', Miss Paddy, 'cos I knows where everythin' bides.  Why, there's
+six new lamp glasses, all a-lying there case o' accidents, wrapped up in
+beautiful tissue paper.  I'd a-lik' you to see they lamp glasses.  Oh!
+an' the new iron safe," getting almost beside himself.  "Did ye see 'im
+a-sittin there in the vestry, on all they hymn books, all neatly stacked
+underneath, looking as important like as if 'e knew 'e was livin' in one
+o' the foinest churches in ould Oireland?"
+
+"When an iron safe sits on hymn books, what do you suppose hatches out?"
+murmured Paddy wickedly to Eileen.
+
+"Did ye see the new bell rope?" ran on Robert, waving his stick about in
+a somewhat dangerous fashion to eyes and noses.  "A brave wee bit o'
+rope that--strong 'nough to hang a man, as I says to Andrew Murphy.  The
+blue ceiling with the yellow stars is all very well, and the new altar,
+and the winder with the angels playin' on real Oirish harps--but 'tis
+all a bit popish to my thinkin'--and I lik' that brave wee rope, and
+they lamp glasses in tissue paper, and they twelve bran' new dusters the
+best.  Faith! 'tis meeself should have shown ye roun'.  I'm shure ye
+didn't see the half.  Did ye notice the new tumbler o' wather for 'is
+rivirence to drink from when 'is sermons is too long-winded for 'im?
+Faith! we did make a job of it.  Ivery 'ole and corner turned out and
+clained.  Shure, it's meeself did the back seat by the font, and to my
+sartin knowledge it 'adn't been cleaned out this ten or twelve year.
+Niver more'n about once since I've had the cue o' the edifice this forty
+year."
+
+This finished Paddy, and with a hasty farewell she sped off to the beach
+for her first sail; later on in the day writing Jack a long epistle upon
+Robert Morony and the church restoration, which Jack read lying at
+full-length on his back on the grass a month later; and his shouts of
+laughter brought his colleagues round to beg a share of the fun.
+
+Two days later Eileen and her mother left for Dublin, and Paddy became
+the spoiled darling of the Parsonage.
+
+She went everywhere just as of old, and though for a little while she
+avoided Mourne Lodge, not wishing to meet Lawrence, she soon found her
+strategic position untenable, and was obliged to yield to the insistent
+persuasions of Kathleen and Doreen, who began to look genuinely puzzled
+and distressed over her extraordinary reluctance to visit them.
+
+Then she decided to take the bull by the horns, and instead of putting
+their first encounter off any longer, seek it purposely, and _get_ it
+over.  With this end in view she bicycled to Mourne Lodge, in a more or
+less ferocious frame of mind, once more to confound the enemy.  As it
+happened, however, the enemy had seen fit to change its tactics, and
+instead of the new graciously polite Lawrence, there was only the old
+casual, indifferent looker-on.  Paddy, with all her artillery in
+readiness, was for once non-plussed.  "How do, Paddy!" he said coolly,
+when he joined them at tea, and sat down as far from her as possible,
+and commenced playing with his dogs, taking no further notice.  Of
+course it is one thing to have all your guns in readiness and get a few
+good round shots in, and quite another to be calmly and loftily ignored,
+and Paddy's instant impulse was to hurl every portable article within
+reach at his head.  To make matters worse, she was furiously aware that
+she had blushed crimson when he first appeared, and that he had probably
+seen it, and drawn his own conclusions.  To show him she did not care,
+she fired one or two shots at him at random, but the result, as she
+ought to have foreseen, was only a further assumption of the very
+indifference that irritated her.  He looked at her as if she were not
+there, and maintained, for the most part, his habitual silence.
+
+Neither did it prove to be for that day only, but each time she came.
+There was just a casual greeting, and then silence, and he declined all
+part in their daily excursions.
+
+Paddy told herself she was relieved he had at last realised it was
+useless to try and make friends; but at the same time it was rather dull
+without Jack, or Eileen, as she could not always be off to friends, and
+she almost wished they could have just one battle-royal to liven things
+up a little.  It was all very well to have no parleying with the enemy,
+but that did not mean one would be content to sit down quietly in sight
+of the enemy's lines, and never so much as fire a shot; certainly not
+for an Irish Fusilier's daughter.  She was vaguely wishing for this
+encounter the day she paddled about alone in Jack's little skiff,
+because it had been too wet to bicycle to Newry, and she looked a little
+doleful, until another skiff, impelled by long, smooth strokes came out
+of the sunlight and drew near.
+
+She watched it coming, admiring the long, even strokes, and wondering a
+little fitfully, who was its occupant.  As it came nearer, she
+recognised Lawrence's thin profile, and lean, muscular figure, she felt
+a sudden quickening of her pulse, and a half hope that there was a
+chance of a skirmish.  Or would he row straight past and merely throw
+her a casual greeting?
+
+On and on came the skiff, and still the long even strokes--evidently he
+was going straight by.  Two strokes away, however, he suddenly stopped
+pulling and leaned on his oars.  The boat drifted up beside hen.  Paddy
+got her guns ready.
+
+"Hullo!" he said casually.  "I thought you were playing in the tennis
+tournament this afternoon."
+
+"I was knocked out first round," trying to speak as casually as he, but
+with a sudden inflection of regret she could not wholly stifle.
+
+"Were you?" in some surprise; "that's a new experience for you!"
+
+"I am out of practice."
+
+"Don't you play in London?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Why not?" rolling himself a cigarette.
+
+"I have no opportunity."
+
+"You must miss it a good deal."
+
+She was silent.
+
+"I suppose you'll be going back soon?" going on with his cigarette with
+a resolutely cold, impassive air.
+
+"Yes!  I haven't much more than a week left."  She fidgeted restlessly.
+This impassivity was too maddening.
+
+"You won't like that?"
+
+It was because the mere thought nearly made her cry, that she replied
+jauntily:
+
+"Oh!  I don't mind much.  I'm getting used to London now."
+
+Still he would not look up.
+
+"Shepherd's Bush is hardly London," a little cruelly.
+
+"Anything is London that is not Omeath," she retorted.
+
+He smiled a little to himself.  "I thought you had just implied that you
+rather liked London."
+
+"I said I didn't mind going back.  I don't; Mother and Eileen will be
+there."  She flashed one of her old glances at him, but he was still too
+much occupied to look up.  It made her vaguely angry.  There was no
+necessity to treat her as if she were a wooden post.  She cast about in
+her mind for a bone of contention, and at just that moment Lawrence
+finished rolling his cigarette, struck a match, and lit it.
+
+"Well, I must be off," in the same careless tone.  "See you at the
+picnic, I suppose,"--and almost before she could reply he had pulled
+away, and gone without once looking at her.
+
+Paddy rowed to the shore, feeling that she wanted to hit some one.
+"He's growing as dull as ditch-water!" she exclaimed snappishly, as she
+tied up her boat.
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE.
+
+THE PICNIC.
+
+A few days later came the great picnic up the mountain.  The Blakes gave
+the picnic, and the guests numbered about seventy, half of them
+proceeding to the climbing-place upon bicycles and the other half
+driving.  The weather was not very promising from the first, but it was
+too large an undertaking to put off, and they accordingly started out.
+
+Paddy went in the Mastermans' carriage with the two aunts.  As they
+drove along she wished, a little unaccountably, that Ted Masterman was
+one of the party.  "After all," she mused, "he was better than no one,
+and it was so very tame without Jack.  Really, there was no one in the
+least adventuresome or enterprising."
+
+Then she fell to wondering what line Lawrence would take, and whether,
+perhaps, to-day, he would rise to a quarrel.  Once more she hoped he
+would.
+
+It was, in consequence, more irritating than ever that Lawrence not only
+proved quite amenable, but appeared in a wholly new light that separated
+them effectually the whole day.  For the first time in any one's
+recollection, he assumed, with his most ingratiating charm, the _role_
+of host.  He was absolutely indefatigable in attending to the wants of
+his guests, most particularly all the elderly ladies and quiet ones.
+The rowdy faction, with Paddy at their head, he ignored just as far as
+was compatible with his new _role_.  Paddy herself he never once
+addressed.  She might, indeed, not have been there.
+
+About five o'clock a slight mistiness frightened most of the older folks
+home out of the damp, but the younger ones, headed by Paddy, who was
+beginning to get desperate, started off on a climbing expedition.  After
+a short time most of them gave in and came back again, but a few went
+on, Paddy still leading.  Then these few gave in also, owing to the
+increasing dampness, and shouted to Paddy to come back.
+
+"Don't wait--I'll soon catch you up," she called, and then she climbed
+on a little higher to see if she could find the wonderful earthwork
+entrenchments she and Jack had once thrown up for a miniature sham
+fight.
+
+The others leaned against rocks and waited, chatting gayly to pass the
+time.  After a little while, as she did not come, they concluded she had
+returned to the starting-place by another path, and trooped back without
+feeling the least concern.  Lawrence and Doreen were helping people into
+their carriages and saying good-by to various guests, when the former
+heard some one ask casually:
+
+"Isn't Paddy Adair here?"
+
+He glanced round.
+
+"She went with your party up the mountain," he said.
+
+"Yes, but we missed her, and concluded she had come back here ahead of
+us by another route."
+
+"She is probably with the Parsonage party," and he vent at once to find
+out.
+
+Meanwhile the mistiness was fast developing into a thick fog, and to
+linger on the mountain in such was extremely dangerous, owing to the
+deep bogs in many places, so everyone hastened to depart.  Lawrence,
+without causing any alarm, managed to find out that nothing had been
+seen of Paddy, and hastened to draw Doreen aside.
+
+"I am going to look for Paddy," he said.  "Don't let her absence get to
+mother's ears or the aunts'.  She is not likely to be far away, and they
+would only worry unnecessarily.  You had better go home and we will
+either follow or go to the Parsonage."
+
+He spoke so quietly and calmly that Doreen felt no misgivings whatever,
+and most of the others somehow had the idea that Paddy had gone home to
+Omeath in the Masterman's carriage with her aunts, so that the picnic
+broke up quite naturally, and the young folks started off on their
+bicycles in haste to get through the ever-thickening fog, little
+dreaming that one of their number was risking his life to find another.
+
+Lawrence thought afterward how foolish he had been to go alone, only he
+had not really imagined Paddy to be more than two or three hundred yards
+away.  He knew the mountain better than most of them, and how there was
+but one passable path from above the spot where they had picnicked, so
+he kept carefully along this, picking his way step by step with
+difficulty in the enshrouding fog.  After half an hour he stopped to
+consider.  He was now certain Paddy had taken a wrong turn and strayed
+aside somewhere, but in what direction it was almost impossible to tell.
+Should he go back and get help, he wondered.  Either course was full of
+danger, but it was not the danger he feared.  So dense was the fog that
+in going back he knew there was a possibility of losing his own way, and
+then Paddy would be worse off than ever, the probability being that no
+one would think of searching for them for hours.  No, he decided
+finally, he would go on and look for her rather than risk getting lost
+or losing time in returning.  Again and again he stood and shouted, but
+the heavy atmosphere drowned his voice, and there was no answering
+shout.  Then gradually a great fear grew up in his heart.  What if harm
+had come to her?  What if this, one of her beloved mountains, had turned
+upon her in pitiless treachery and swallowed her up in one of its
+treacherous bogs?  He held his breath with horror at the thought.
+
+Surely, surely, no harm could come to her--it could not be; even stern,
+inexorable Nature could surely let no hair of her head be hurt!  Yet all
+around was unseen danger, that direst of all foes, and he knew that,
+even if she were alive, to struggle through that mountain mist was to
+hold one's life by a thread.
+
+Yet he pressed forward, the nameless fear growing ever stronger in his
+heart and filling all his being with an anguish of intolerable suspense.
+By the help of a walking stick he carried he was enabled to find the
+path and keep to it, otherwise he would have been likely to stray aside
+into a bog himself.  But the thought of personal danger found no room in
+his brain; he would have risked his life a hundred times for Paddy and
+thought nothing of it.
+
+He must have been out nearly an hour, going further and further from
+home all the time, when, in answer to his call, he fancied he heard a
+distant reply.
+
+"Paddy!" he shouted again.  "Paddy!--Paddy!  Are you there?"
+
+He listened with painful intentness, and then with a sudden thrill of
+almost ungovernable joy, as he heard a faint voice call "Here!" and
+afterward give the cry they had used when searching for each other since
+childhood.
+
+"I am coming!" he shouted.  "Don't move!" and he began picking his steps
+in the direction from whence the voice came.
+
+After great difficulty and many stumbles, he at last found himself in
+close proximity to the call that sounded from time to time to guide him,
+and then through the thickness he saw the wood of a little kind of
+shelter probably used at some time for tethering goats, and a second
+later he had gripped hold of Paddy herself.
+
+And she made no effort to resist him as, carried away by a rush of
+feeling, he could not control, he strained her, half-fainting, to his
+heart.
+
+Paddy trembled violently from weakness.  Her cotton blouse was wet
+through, and she was perished with cold and dread, for she had passed
+through a terrible time trying to find her way back to the others before
+she came across the little shelter and sank down worn out.  Without
+quite knowing it, she clung to Lawrence for a few moments, and under the
+sudden reaction broke down into a few gasping sobs.
+
+He soothed her with the utmost tenderness, and then slipped off his coat
+and made her put it on, buttoning it up himself.  He next arranged a
+kind of seat for her, where she could lean back against the framework of
+the hut, and then set to work at once to make a fire, cursing himself
+inwardly that he had not had the sense to bring a flask of brandy.
+
+Fortunately he had plenty of matches and some old letters, so that, by
+pulling down pieces of the shelter, he was quickly able to light a
+comforting fire, and busied himself keeping it going while Paddy had
+time to recover herself.
+
+When she did so, however, her first impulse was to shrink away, and
+there was a questioning expression in her eyes as she watched him.
+
+He noticed it at once, and sought to give her confidence by carefully
+keeping his face turned away from her.
+
+"Are you warmer now?" he asked.  "I'm so vexed I came away without a
+flask."
+
+"I am quite warm," she said, and then suddenly discovered he was in his
+shirtsleeves, and exclaimed, "Where is your coat?"
+
+"I got so hot climbing," he replied unblushingly, "and then, after
+lighting the fire, I could not bear it on."
+
+She looked down at herself.
+
+"No, no, you have given it to me," she cried.  "Oh, how could you--you
+will be frozen!" and she began to take it off.
+
+"No, Paddy," and a firm hand closed over hers; "you are not to take it
+off."
+
+"But I must," she cried.  "I can't see you catching your death of cold.
+Let go, Lawrence."
+
+The hand only held more firmly.
+
+"Listen to me.  I have got twice the hardihood that you have, and there
+is not the least fear of my catching cold.  You are in my care until
+someone comes to look for us or we are able to find our way back, and I
+shall not allow you to take off that coat."
+
+He smiled, and in the firelight his thin face was very winning.
+
+"If you are obstinate, I shall just sit beside you and hold it on."
+
+Paddy buried her face in her hands and became suddenly silent.
+
+Lawrence stood and looked at her bent head in the firelight, and a
+yearning expression that made his face more attractive than ever stole
+over his features.  He longed to fold her in his arms once more and
+cheer and soothe her, but, even if it were possible, he had no longer
+the excuse of a sudden uncontrollable rush of feeling.  So, instead, he
+folded his arms very tightly, bit his teeth together, and, moving to the
+further side of the fire, stood leaning against the wall.  At least
+there was no harm in looking at her, as long as his gaze did not
+embarrass her.  He would play fair--a great many undesirable things he
+might be, but he would never have dreamed of taking any advantage of
+such a circumstance as this which threw them alone together in peril on
+the mountain.  He would only look when he knew she was unaware of it.
+He was glad that she elected to sit thus, with her face buried on her
+arms.  At least it made it possible for him to gaze and gaze.  He forgot
+that he was getting chilled to the bone from the damp in spite of the
+fire.  Why should he remember so slight a thing as that?--why, until it
+was necessary, remember anything but that they two were alone together,
+shut off from all the world, in the little hut on the mountain.  And,
+sweetest thought of all, for the time being she was in his care,
+dependent on him for warmth and safety, perhaps for life itself?  So he
+stood silently on the far side of the hut, tending the fire when it
+needed it, and watching, with his soul in his eyes, how the little
+flames shone on her beautiful hair.  He was afraid to think of the
+moment when he had first found her and she had half-clung to him.  It
+unmanned him.  If he let his mind dwell on it, he might forget that
+under no circumstances must he take advantage of their position.  He
+wondered if she had heard what he said in those first moments, and if
+that was why she so persistently kept her face hidden?  It occurred to
+him that he had never really known before how beautiful her hair was.
+The damp had only made it wave and curl more luxuriantly, and when a
+specially bright flame shot up, it shone like burnished copper.  He felt
+a sudden longing to touch it--to run his fingers through it, and let the
+little stray tendrils curl round them.  It required all his strength to
+stay patiently there on the other side of the hut.
+
+After a time he stepped across to her.
+
+"You must be getting cramped," he said.  "Let me try and make you more
+comfortable."
+
+She let him help her to her feet, and afterward try to find a new
+position.  While doing so, he paused a moment and seemed to be
+hesitating.  Then he bent toward her and said very quietly:
+
+"If you would lean on me, Paddy, I could keep you so warm and
+comfortable."
+
+He waited for her to speak.
+
+"I would rather not," she answered, in a low, strained voice, and he
+said no more about it.
+
+Presently, however, when she seemed to be settled as comfortably as
+circumstances would permit, he asked: "Would you rather I left you, and
+tried to get down the mountain to fetch help?"
+
+She caught her breath with a queer little gulp, and he leaned lower to
+catch her answer.
+
+"I don't want to bother you, Paddy, and I'm not afraid.  I will go and
+try, if you would rather."
+
+Still there was no answer.  Paddy was wrestling between a wish for him
+to stay and a feeling that, to be true to herself, she ought to tell him
+to go.
+
+Lawrence stood upright and looked down at her a few moments in silence.
+At last he spoke again, and there was a suggestion of pain in his voice:
+
+"I won't worry you, Paddy, if you'll let me stay.  I--I would much
+rather not leave you here alone."  He leaned down.  "What shall I do,
+Paddy?"
+
+"Don't go," she said in a low voice he could only just distinguish, but
+his face brightened all over instantly, as he turned away to busy
+himself again with the fire, afterward taking up his stand once more on
+the far side from her.
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY SIX.
+
+THE RESCUE.
+
+Meanwhile the little ladies at the Parsonage looked anxiously out into
+the fog, and wondered that Paddy should have gone to Mourne Lodge on
+such a night.
+
+"I suppose they will keep her until to-morrow," Miss Jane remarked; "but
+I am rather sorry she went.  It is just the weather to take cold."
+
+And at Mourne Lodge Mrs Blake said: "How odd of Lawrence to stay at the
+Parsonage so late.  Did you say he went home with Paddy, Doreen?"
+
+Doreen looked worried, but she only replied:
+
+"Yes; he said he should not be late."
+
+Another half-hour passed, and then Mrs Blake asked; "What made him go
+home with Paddy at all, Doreen?"
+
+Doreen was now fidgeting nervously, glancing constantly at the clock,
+and at last she decided to tell her mother exactly what had passed.
+Almost before she had finished, Mrs Blake was out in the hall
+peremptorily ordering one of the stable-boys to be sent for at once, and
+she waited at the open door until he came.
+
+"Take a bicycle," she cried, in the same decisive manner, "and ride as
+hard as you can to Omeath Parsonage.  Go to the back door, and, without
+making any noise, find out from the servants if Mr Lawrence has been
+there this evening.  If he is there it is all right! but if not, come
+back here as quickly as possible, and tell them not to let the Misses
+O'Hara know that you came.  Do you understand?"
+
+"Yes, m'm," and in two seconds the boy was gone.
+
+Another anxious half-hour passed, during the whole of which Mrs Blake
+paced the drawing-room, quite unable to sit still a moment.  When she
+heard a step on the gravel, she hurried instantly to the front door.
+
+"Is he there?" she asked, quite unable to conceal her anxiety.
+
+"No, m'm--he has not been there at all, and they all think Miss Adair is
+here.  I told them not to say anything, but cook is so anxious she is
+coming here on foot now."
+
+Mrs Blake blanched a death-like hue, but never for an instant lost her
+head.
+
+"Rouse George at once," she exclaimed, naming the head coachman, who had
+been with them for years, "and tell him not to lose a second in coming
+here.  Stay--tell him Mr Lawrence and Miss Adair are lost on the
+mountains, and he must get a search party at once; then come to me."
+
+The boy rushed off, and she turned quickly to the housekeeper, now
+anxiously waiting near.
+
+"Blankets, Mrs Best," with almost unnatural calmness, "and a flask of
+brandy, and candles for the lanterns.  There is nothing else we can
+prepare.  I think."
+
+George had gone to bed, which made it only the more incredible how he
+got up and got his party together in the short space before he was at
+the hall door; but there they stood, four alert men, with poles and
+lanterns, perfectly ready to risk their lives at a moment's notice for
+the master and Miss Adair.  Mrs Blake explained in a few short
+sentences what had occurred and which way they had better take, but it
+was only at the very last she faltered.
+
+"Don't come back without them, George," she said, in a low, husky voice,
+to the faithful old servant, and, with a like huskiness in his own
+throat, he answered:
+
+"I will not, m'm."
+
+Then commenced another terrible watch for the mother and her two
+daughters, when each tried in vain to frame words that might help the
+others.
+
+There was nothing for it but to endure in silence and continue that
+restless pacing to and fro.  At twelve o'clock the housekeeper came in
+with hot cocoa and biscuits, but all turned away at once.  Mrs Best was
+another old and privileged servant, however, so she would take no
+refusal.
+
+"Shure, 'tis no good gettin' fainting," she said, trying to speak
+cheerily.  "Indeed, m'm, it's meeself will have to give it ye if ye
+won't take it."  And then they tried to drink the cocoa to please her.
+
+"There's Eliza downstairs," she continued.  "About as much use as a
+child, rocking to and fro under her apron and moaning about little Miss
+Paddy, and what a wonderful baby she was, as if that would do any one
+any good.  Relating all the mischief she used to be up to in one breath,
+and what a sainted angel she is in the next."
+
+"Poor Eliza," said Mrs Blake, with a smile.  "She is a faithful old
+soul.  To think of her walking all this way from Omeath upon such a
+night!"
+
+Still the time crept on and no footsteps sounded on the gravel, and away
+up the mountain Lawrence tended his little fire and began to look round
+anxiously for the fuel which was fast dwindling away.  From time to time
+he stepped out into the fog and shouted, but sound could scarcely pierce
+the dense air, and he knew he would not be heard any distance away.
+Each time when he stepped out Paddy raised her head and watched him,
+instead of continuing her gaze at the flickering fire, but the last time
+he noticed that she did not stir.
+
+He bent down over her and said her name softly, but there was no answer,
+and he saw that, worn out with exhaustion, she had fallen into a
+troubled sleep.  For a few moments he was at his wits' end to know what
+to do for the best.  The fire could not be kept going much longer, and
+meanwhile the damp cold increased hourly.  Should he rouse her and try
+to make the descent?  Which course was the least dangerous?--to crouch
+in the cold, damp shelter, or try and pierce the black gloom of the
+night?  He looked at the sleeping form a moment, and then made up his
+mind.  In such a strait, all things must be disregarded except whatever
+might diminish the danger.  Whereupon, having come to a decision, he
+immediately set about carrying it out to the exclusion of all else.
+First he hunted round for every scrap of possible fuel and made up the
+fire; then, very tenderly and gently, he gathered Paddy into his arms,
+as if she had been a child and soothed her into a deep, dreamless
+slumber.
+
+How long they remained thus he did not know.  Paddy never stirred after
+the first half-unconscious resistance, but just slept on in the calmest,
+childlike sleep, and rather than disturb her he kept the same position,
+regardless of the severe cramp that seized him first in one limb and
+then another.
+
+The only movement he made was to bend occasionally and touch her hair
+with his lips, but, apart from this, the fire went out and they remained
+in absolute silence and stillness--Paddy kept warm and comfortable and
+soothed into a restful slumber, while he sat upright, without even a
+coat, numbed with the damp and cold and a martyr to cramp.
+
+Only what of it?  While she lay in his arms, and every nerve of his body
+was strained in serving her, could he ask more?  Lawrence looked out
+into the awful gloom, felt the creeping cold through all his bones and
+the sharp, shooting pains in his limbs, and was content.  Of a truth he
+was not a man to do his loving by halves when it was real.
+
+But human nature is not infallible, and it is doubtful if he could have
+endured much longer by the time a vague sound over the mountain fell on
+his ear.  He raised his head and listened intently.
+
+Yes--there it was again--a shout!  Good God! some one was coming to
+them.  With the utmost gentleness he managed to disengage himself and
+then struggle to his feet, but only to collapse ignominiously on to the
+ground, overcome by cramp through his whole body.  He made another
+effort, and dragged himself up by the wall; then, still clinging to it,
+shouted with all his might.
+
+Instantly rang back an answering shout, and within five minutes the
+little search party stood in the tumbled-down shelter, almost too
+overjoyed for words.
+
+Old George gripped his young master's hand and the tears rained down his
+face.
+
+"We were losing heart," he said.  "We were almost giving you up, but I'd
+never have gone back to face the mistress without you."
+
+"Have you blankets?"  Lawrence asked, trying not to show what he was
+suffering, and still quite unable to stand alone.
+
+George took in the situation at a glance, seeing him in shirtsleeves and
+the deadly pallor on his face.
+
+"The young lady won't hurt for a minute or two," he said with sudden
+sharpness to the others.  "Come and help me chafe the master's limbs,"
+and he almost lifted Lawrence bodily, laying him down on a blanket and
+setting to work with a will, after first giving him some brandy.  After
+a little while the pain gave and the colour came back to his lips, but
+meanwhile Paddy had awakened, and, without making any sound, sat
+watching.  She knew instinctively what had happened, and she would not
+for worlds have attracted any attention to herself until Lawrence was
+better, his drawn face and blue lips going straight to her heart.
+
+After a little, with George's help, Lawrence managed to get to his feet
+and stand upright, and then he turned at once to Paddy.
+
+"Give me the flask," he said, and the others waited while he poured out
+some brandy and held it to her lips.  Then he seemed quite himself
+again, and prepared to start for home, arranging everything, and, as
+usual, compelling acquiescence.  Paddy wanted to try and walk, but he
+would not hear of it, and finally she had to get into the litter he
+contrived for her with blankets and be carried down the steep and
+dangerous slope.
+
+At three in the morning the sound of footsteps at last fell on the
+straining ears at Mourne Lodge, and Mrs Blake hastened wildly to the
+door, her composure fast giving way.
+
+"Lawrence!" she called out into the night.  "Lawrence!"  And only a
+mother could have spoken the name so.
+
+"We're all right, mother," came back the answer cheerily; but as he came
+up, overcome at last, Mrs Blake fainted into his arms.
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN.
+
+"STAY HERE WITH ME."
+
+Paddy lay on the drawing-room sofa at the Parsonage and watched the
+birds skimming over the loch with a strained, anxious expression in her
+usually laughing eyes.  Her aunts had fetched her from Mourne Lodge that
+morning, and there had been a great scene of general weeping and
+embracing and exclaiming.  The news had somehow got all round the
+neighbourhood in an incredibly short time, and when Miss Mary was
+watching casually for Paddy to come home on her bicycle about eleven,
+there came instead a boy with the news that she and Lawrence had been
+lost in the fog all night and carried home in the morning.
+
+Instantly there was great consternation in the Parsonage, and the small
+boy sent flying off for the one conveyance available in Omeath, in
+which, immediately afterward, the two sisters set out for Mourne Lodge.
+They found Paddy still a little dazed and shaken, but otherwise none the
+worse for her adventure.
+
+"Lawrence saved me," she said as soon as they gave her time to speak.
+"If it had not been for him, I should probably have died of cold.  He
+risked his life for me."
+
+That was quite enough, and away rushed Miss Jane, with Miss Mary
+hurrying after her, to look for Lawrence.  They found him in his den,
+with newspapers lying round him, apparently reading calmly.  Only could
+they have looked in unobserved a moment sooner, they would have seen the
+newspapers were all out of reach, and, with compressed lips and knitted
+forehead he was staring gloomily at the floor lost in thought.  However,
+he heard footsteps, and snatched up a paper just as the door opened, and
+neither of them had good enough eyesight to see that the sheet he held
+before him was covered with advertisements for housemaids and cooks.
+
+Miss Jane came up to him with an almost sublime expression of gratitude.
+
+"Paddy says you saved her life, Lawrence," she said simply.  "I feel as
+if I must go down on my knees to you."
+
+"Pray don't," he answered in his usual manner.  "I won't answer for the
+floor being particularly clean.  I simply hate the room being dusted,
+you know."
+
+He got up, and with a little laugh tried to change the conversation.
+But neither of the ladies had the least intention of being put off in
+this manner, and they tried his patience considerably before they had
+finished their outpouring of grateful thanks.  Then they retired again,
+and Lawrence closed the door after them with a momentary relief, only to
+be quickly superseded by his previous gloom.  It was as though he had
+aged since yesterday.  Several times last night, and again this morning
+when he sat beside her a little while in her bedroom, his mother had
+watched him covertly, and wondered what there was in his face that
+seemed strange to her.  Now, when left alone again, he threw the papers
+aside and, sitting down at his writing table, buried his face in his
+hands.
+
+He had been up early in spite of his awful night, had seen George and
+the other three men, and sat with his mother, and sent the loveliest
+flowers Mourne Lodge could produce to Paddy's bedroom; and now it was
+only mid-day, though it seemed half a life-time since he had sat in the
+hut holding Paddy, regardless of all things in heaven and earth but his
+precious burden.  He went over everything again and again, moment by
+moment, unable to bring his mind to anything else.  The night of such
+horror to all others was already to him the most precious memory of his
+life.
+
+Only what was to come next?  It was this thought that caused that moody,
+unheeding stare into vacancy.
+
+"I will not live without her--she shall come to me," he muttered
+half-fiercely, and dreamt of all he would say to win her when they met.
+
+Meanwhile the aunties took Paddy back with them, insisting upon watching
+over her as if she were an invalid, and finally inveigling her to the
+drawing-room sofa to lie quietly with closed blinds.
+
+In this Paddy was not sorry to acquiesce.  She wanted to be alone, and
+the shaded light was soothing.  Through a dim sense of confusion--a
+confusion that she felt incapable of unravelling as to what had, and
+what had not, taken place--there were certain recollections that made
+her cheeks burn, and caused her to hide shrinking eyes in the cushions.
+How, oh how, was she ever to face him with those recollections lying
+between them?  She half knew that in the first moment she had clung to
+him, and she had an indistinct remembrance that he had kissed her hair,
+and spoken in a low, passionate voice, calling her soft, endearing
+names.
+
+Afterward, certainly, they had regained their old footing, but what
+about that long sleep?  Under what conditions had she been able to sleep
+thus peacefully in the midst of such discomfort?  That was the question
+Paddy dare not face, remembering his pallid cheeks and blue lips, while
+the old coachman brought the circulation back into his cramped limbs.
+She half hoped he would come to-day, while she was lying in the darkened
+room.  It would be easier to get through the interview in the dark.  But
+he did not come, and she lay restlessly, puzzling out the enigma in
+which their adventure had placed her.
+
+What about that hate of hers!  Can one--_may_ one--hate one's preserver!
+She half prayed he would let her thank him quietly, and then go away.
+For hate or no hate, she perhaps owed him her life, and gratitude was
+his due.
+
+But two days passed, and Lawrence did not come, and as she recovered
+further from the shock, she rallied herself, and felt more equal to the
+interview.  She believed it was consideration for her that kept him
+away, and was grateful.  In two days more her holiday would be up and
+she must return to London, and once away the adventure could be put
+aside.  If only it had not been so hard to go--
+
+On the afternoon of the third day Paddy wandered alone to a little creek
+by the loch, and, sitting down on a fallen tree, sank her chin in her
+hands and gazed across the water with a whole world of yearning longing
+in her eyes at the thought of leaving it all and returning to the
+streets, and chimney-pots, and smuts.  So rapt was she that she did not
+hear some one approach over the moss and stand silently beside her--some
+one who saw the yearning, and read it aright with mingled feelings of
+regret and gladness.
+
+"I began to think I'd never find you," he said at last in his quietest
+way, and Paddy started violently, and flushed to the roots of her hair,
+while she continued gazing across the loch, quite unable to meet his
+eyes.
+
+He sat down on the log beside her, and leaned forward with his arms
+across his knees, playing idly with a twig he had picked up.
+
+"I went to the Parsonage first," he continued, "and they told me you had
+gone out directly after lunch, and they believed you were sailing.  I
+went down to the beach and found the boat, and decided you had taken a
+walk instead, and came to look for you.  I was lucky to find you in such
+an out-of-the-way corner.  Are you quite all right again!"
+
+He was still keeping his eyes from her, playing with the twig, and Paddy
+unconsciously clenched her hands hard in her effort to feel collected.
+
+"Yes, thank you!"  She hesitated, still looking hard at the loch.  Then
+she gulped down a long breath and took the plunge.  "I am glad you have
+come.  I have been wanting to see you."  She noticed suddenly that he
+looked white and ill, and his face was a little drawn.  "Have you been
+ill?"
+
+"No, I have not been ill, only worried.  I should have come sooner--
+only--" he hesitated.
+
+"I wanted to see you to thank you," she interrupted.  "Of course I know
+you risked your life to save mine.  I might easily have died up there
+with the cold--and you might easily have slipped into a bog looking for
+me.  No--" as he tried to stop her, "I must go on.  Don't you see how
+it's just strangling me to remember that you risked so much--after--
+after--" her voice died away, she could find no words.  She knew all in
+a moment that the casual acquaintance of the last three weeks was once
+more the lover, and the further complication unnerved her.
+
+"As if that made any difference," a little harshly.  "Haven't I told you
+that your scorn and threats cannot in any way change me--and never will.
+Good God! do you suppose I care two straws about risking my
+twopenny-halfpenny life when it is for you?"
+
+She shrank away visibly, and he changed his manner.
+
+"There, I don't want to worry you--but for Heaven's sake don't thank me.
+I can't stand it.  There can be no question of thanks between you and
+me."
+
+"But how can I help it?" she cried a little piteously.  "Don't you
+understand that I _must_ thank you--that it is the one and only return I
+can make?"
+
+He looked into her face a moment and decided to humour her.
+
+"Very well, only let us consider it finished.  If it eases your mind, I
+will accept your gratitude; but I must be allowed to add it is
+absolutely uncalled-for, seeing I would risk a dozen lives for you
+cheerfully any day."
+
+Her eyes fell before his, and she clenched her hands yet harder.  Then
+he quite suddenly changed the subject.
+
+"They tell me you are going back to London in two days.  Is that so?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"How you must hate it?"  He looked round at the gleaming, beautiful loch
+and the mountains beyond.  "It must be desperately hard to go back."
+She could not trust herself to speak, and he continued in a voice that
+had suddenly grown dangerously sympathetic.  "I always think it is
+harder for you than the others.  Your mother and Eileen always have each
+other, and any one can see how much that means to both.  But you,
+somehow--since the dear old General died--seem to have had no one to
+take his place."
+
+Great tears gathered in her eyes, and fell on her clasped hands.  Why,
+or why, did he unman her!  He was playing with the twig again, and
+pretending not to notice.  "Isn't that so?" he asked.
+
+She caught her breath and steadied her voice with an effort.
+
+"I have been very fortunate," she said.  "I might have had to go right
+away from everybody as a nursery governess, instead of having so many
+friends, and such a nice post, and plenty of liberty."
+
+"But it is still London, isn't it?  And after all, even friends are
+hardly to you what the mountains, and the loch, and the country life
+were.  Be honest, Paddy," suddenly looking into her face.  "Don't you
+just hate to have to go away and leave it all again?--don't you just
+hate it like the devil?"
+
+She threw back her head with a sudden jerk, as if from some unendurable
+thought.
+
+"Oh, yes--yes," she breathed, "like the devil, there is no other word.
+But what of it?  I am going--I must go--I am not the only one who has
+had to give up a country home.  Why do you make it harder for me?  Why
+do you remind me of it at all?"
+
+He leaned toward her, and she felt his eyes looking through into her
+soul.  "I remind you, because I don't want you to go.  Do you think it
+doesn't hurt me too--_now_?  I, with all that I have--you with nothing--
+not even your own special chum since the General died."
+
+She drew her hand across her eyes hurriedly.
+
+"And it isn't as if you were obliged to go."  He was leaning nearer--
+nearer.  "Paddy, dear little woman, don't go.  Give it all up and stay
+here with me."
+
+"No, no.  It is impossible.  Please leave off.  Why won't you
+understand?" and she wrung her hands together.
+
+"It is _not_ impossible," resolutely, "and it must be.  It has got to
+be, Paddy.  It is you who won't understand."  Then he ran on
+whimsically, giving her time to collect herself: "Good Lord! it seems
+only the other day I was carrying you round on my shoulder, when I came
+home from Eton for the holidays.  I remember I thought, you were the
+ugliest little creature I had ever set eyes on.  You were so ugly, you
+fascinated; I couldn't take my eyes off you.  But even then you had a
+way with you.  Every one always did exactly as you wanted.  If they
+didn't, you got into no end of a fury, and hit out right and left.  It
+was awful sport making you wild, Paddy.  Sometimes, when I've got hold
+of you, you've kicked at me as hard as you could with your fat little
+legs, but I always enjoyed the fun of it.  I didn't think I'd ever want
+to marry you, though," with a whimsical smile; "it would have seemed too
+much like inviting a hurricane to one's fireside.  It's quite the very
+last thing that would ever have entered my head, until--until--" he
+paused.  "I don't know when it began, Paddy, but now I want nothing else
+in heaven or earth."
+
+"Please don't go on," she managed to say; "please don't."
+
+"Ah, but I want to; and after all it needn't hurt you.  It's so good to
+have you all alone like this and tell you about it.  Ever since the
+night on the mountain, I've been talking and smiling in my usual inane
+fashion, and all the time there was a seething volcano underneath.  It
+hasn't been a pleasant two days; I wouldn't care about having them over
+again.  Hour after hour I have longed to start off to the Parsonage;
+sometimes I have got as far as the lodge.  But I felt I ought to give
+you time to recover thoroughly, and so I forced myself to turn back.
+When I awoke this morning I knew I should come to day.  I had reached
+the utmost limit of my patience.  Did you expect me?  Did you, perhaps,
+hope I should come to-day!"  She had put her hands up to her face, and
+now he tried to draw one of them away.  "Why won't you look at me,
+Paddy!  Why won't you let me see your face!  Come, be your own bright
+self again.  Chuck all this cursed nonsense about being impossible.
+Don't you know that my arms are aching for you?  Do you hear,
+Paddy!--_aching_ for you--and you sit there so silent and distant.  Are
+you thinking of London and that beastly dispensary!  Why, it's all done
+with, little woman; your home is going to be here in the future.  Mourne
+Lodge is yours, and the horses are yours, and the boats, and the
+shooting, and everything.  Ah!  I'll make you so happy--"
+
+She got up swiftly, suddenly, and thrust her hands out before her, as if
+warding off something.  Her face was deathly white, and she looked only
+at the loch.
+
+"Oh, stop! stop!  Don't you realise it is _impossible_?"  He changed
+colour visibly.
+
+"Perhaps I have been too sudden after all," he said.  "Perhaps by and
+by--"
+
+"No, _newer_," and she mustered all her powers for the final word.
+
+He gave a queer little laugh.
+
+"`Never' is a long time," with a touch of the old cynical manner.
+
+"I mean it," resolutely.
+
+"You mean you prefer London--and the dispensary--and the loneliness to
+Mourne Lodge, and the loch, and the mountains?"
+
+She was silent.
+
+"Is that what you mean, Paddy!"
+
+She tried to evade the question, but he would not let her.  He stood up
+close to her, his face a little stern, his lips rigid.  "Look at me,
+Paddy," in a tone of command.
+
+She hesitated a second, then once again summoned all her courage, and
+looked steadily into his eyes.
+
+"Now, why won't you stay here and be happy, instead of going back?"
+
+"Because I hate you," and though her voice was low it contained no
+shadow of faltering.
+
+Lawrence turned away sharply, and stood looking at the loch.  His face
+grew, if anything, a little sterner, but showed no symptoms of defeat.
+Paddy could only wait, feeling vaguely wretched.
+
+When he spoke his voice had changed somewhat.  "You are candid as ever,
+but I am not convinced.  It is because I believe I can turn your hate
+into love, I will not give in.  Tell me one thing--is it the old bone of
+contention that stands between us!"
+
+Paddy was silent.
+
+"Tell me," he reiterated.
+
+She answered hesitatingly.  "I--I--don't want to be unkind after--"
+
+"Spare me that," with a slight sneer.  "Try and pretend the mountain
+incident is a myth."
+
+She looked wretched.
+
+"Well, what were you going to say?  You needn't mind about being unkind.
+You forget I am used to it."
+
+"I was going to say--" She hesitated again, searching about for words.
+"Oh, don't you realise that I don't trust you?  Why do you put me in the
+difficult position of having to say this, just now of all times!  Can't
+we leave it at that?  Won't you believe I am grateful for the other
+night, and leave it there?"
+
+"No.  By God!  I won't," and there was something almost fierce about
+him.  The very fact that she shrank from him, only seemed to madden him,
+and it was as though he tried to soothe his own goaded feelings by
+goading hers.  "The other night has only made it more impossible to
+leave it there.  Why, when I found you, I took you in my arms--you know
+I did."  The colour flashed in her cheeks, and he ran on: "Just as if--
+feeling as I do--having once had you in my arms, I'm going to tamely let
+you go again.  Why, I never took my eyes off you the whole time.  When I
+couldn't see your face, I watched your hair.  It was freezingly cold,
+and I never knew it.  It might just as well have been overpoweringly
+hot.  I had got you--there--all alone--in my care--dependent on me--
+icebergs and volcanoes themselves couldn't have crushed me."  He stopped
+as if he could hardly trust himself to say any more, and with a
+desperate attempt to bring him back to a commonplace level she said,
+"Please don't go on.  You've managed to be cold enough the last three
+weeks.  Let us go back to that again."
+
+"You silly little goose!"--and he laughed harshly--"cold--to you! ah,
+ah!  I was no more cold then than I am now, of course I wasn't.  When we
+have been together you haven't said a word that I have not heard, nor
+moved an inch without my knowing.  It was a subterfuge to see if you
+noticed; and you did.  Ah, ah, Paddy, that's one to me.  You know you
+wanted me to quarrel, and I wouldn't.  Now own up."
+
+He tried to take her hand, but she drew away, and stood with them both
+clasped behind her.  She began to feel that the whole situation was
+getting beyond her.
+
+Then suddenly, with his customary variableness, Lawrence grew quiet
+again.
+
+"You say you don't trust me.  Well, I will show you I can be trusted.  I
+have never cared enough before.  Is that altogether my fault?  I care
+enough now, and I will show you.  Is it that alone that stands between
+us?  If you could trust me, you would let yourself go?  Paddy!"--he
+moved suddenly nearer, and looked squarely into her eyes--"just as if I
+didn't know that under ordinary circumstances I should win you easily
+enough.  I'm not bragging.  Heaven knows I've faults enough, but
+bragging is not among them.  It's because, somehow, I know that under
+ordinary circumstances it would be natural for your love to surrender to
+mine, before anyone else you know, that I snap my fingers when you
+protest that you hate me, and refuse to be daunted.  If I could slay the
+spectre between us, and show you that I was to be trusted, would you
+marry me?"
+
+Paddy looked hard at the loch, and said, "No."
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"When I have said a thing, I have said it.  I will not marry you,
+because I hate you."
+
+"Now you are merely absurd.  Why do you hate me?"
+
+"Because I cannot forget the past."
+
+He gave an impatient gesture.  "Heroics!  Heroics!--_you_ were never
+hurt.  I tell you it is a spectre, and you ought to have the sense to
+slay it.  Instead, you enlarge on it--positively drape it in visionary
+attributes, and offer yourself as a sort of burnt offering to it.  You
+ought to have lived a few hundred years ago.  By Gad!  Paddy, you'd have
+made a fine Joan of Arc!" and he laughed with a touch of bitterness.
+
+Paddy stared at the loch and remained silent.
+
+"Patricia the Great at the head of an avenging army--leading on fools
+and knights-errant--devastating a peaceful, harmless land for the sake
+of a Dream--a Prejudice--a Chimera.  I see it all."
+
+She looked helplessly unhappy, but he would not spare her.
+
+"Listen to me, Patricia the Great.  You shall keep your feud, and cling
+to your prejudice a little longer, but _I will not give in_.  I want
+you.  That at least is a plain, ungarnished truth.  Perhaps if you knew
+me as well as some, you would realise that it is the sort of truth I
+have a little habit of making into a fact, in spite of dreams and
+prejudices.  This thing has got to be, Paddy.  I repeat what I said
+before.  If I am worth my name, I will win you yet."
+
+"Ah, why will you talk like this, when it is so useless," she cried.
+"Why will you not be friends?  Lawrence, let us be friends.  Let me
+thank you for the other night, and, for the sake of it, drop the old
+feud.  I will try to do this to show you I am sincere in my gratitude."
+
+His face grew suddenly whiter than ever with concentrated passion and
+determination.  "We will do nothing of the kind.  I don't want your
+friendship.  You can take it back.  Do you hear?  I refuse your kindly
+pat on the shoulder, and your offer to be a good girl because you think
+you owe me thanks.  You can keep your feud and your hatred--anything is
+better than a soppy middle course.  It is my turn now, and I refuse your
+offer of sisterly affection, which is what it amounts to.  I will have
+your love some day, but until then, your hate, please.  As long as you
+go on hating I shall know at least that you are not indifferent, and
+that the sound of my name does not pass unheeded by your ears.  And we
+will continue to cross swords--we will be as we were before.  If you
+want to show this gratitude you talk of, show it that way; it is the
+only thing I ask of you."
+
+She shrank from him a little bewildered.  The strength of his passion
+stirred every fibre of her being, and the thought crossed her--would she
+be able to withstand him for long?  But Lawrence cooled suddenly.  He
+had said his say; for the present, there was nothing further to be
+gained.  In two minutes his face was almost as impassive as of old, as
+he remarked cynically:
+
+"Trust an old fool for being a big fool.  I am ranting like a street
+preacher.  Well, I will go home and find my level again.  Good-by,
+Paddy."  He gripped her hand with such force that she uttered a little
+cry.
+
+"There, I didn't mean to hurt you, only to show you how I can grip, if I
+make up my mind to anything.  Remember I am your enemy.  Go on hating as
+hard as you like, until I make you love.  We shall meet again soon in
+London."
+
+Then he strode off through the wood, and left her by the loch alone.
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT.
+
+GWEN'S VIEWS ON MATRIMONY.
+
+When Paddy got back to London, her mother, and Eileen, and the doctor,
+and even Basil thought she was changed in some way, but they did not
+know how.  She was quieter than she used to be, or at any rate given to
+moods, bursting out now and then into unusual spirits which had yet a
+ring of not being perfectly genuine.
+
+Curiously enough, perhaps, Gwendoline Carew was the only one who
+actually knew what was affecting her.  She had met Lawrence in the
+autumn at a shooting party at a mutual friend's, and quickly recognised
+some change in him too.  Of course she had taken the first opportunity
+to tax him with it, and absolutely refused to be put off with cynicism
+or scoffing or anything else.
+
+"Don't waste time talking to me like this, Lawrie," she had said, "as if
+I didn't know you too well by this time.  Just have the grace to bow
+your superior old head for once, and own you've reached a fence you
+can't clear."
+
+"Wouldn't it be better to make sure first?  I wouldn't for the world
+tell you an untruth."
+
+"I'll risk it.  Besides, Lawrie, who knows!  I might be able to help."
+
+"I have rather a weakness for managing my own affairs."
+
+"I know you have, and on the whole they do you credit, but it seems to
+me there's something on foot now, that you're just not quite so dead
+certain sure about as usual."
+
+Lawrence was silent.
+
+"Once before it was the same," said Gwen.  "Don't you remember when a
+certain father died, and you were in doubt?  Well, didn't Gwen manage
+you then and help to keep you from running off the track!"
+
+"I am not in doubt now," he answered.
+
+"No, but I strongly suspect that you are in love."
+
+He only looked steadily before him and made no sign.
+
+"If it's Paddy," said candid Gwen, "I'll just move heaven and earth to
+help you.  If it isn't you can `gang yer ain gait.'"
+
+She waited, and presently Lawrence said quietly: "It is Paddy."
+
+Whereupon Gwen forgot she was a young personage of importance mentioned
+often in the fashionable papers, and danced a little jig all round the
+room.
+
+"Lovely!" she cried, "just lovely!  You must get married before me so
+that I can be a bridesmaid, Lawrie."
+
+"You are somewhat premature," dryly.  "Paddy has refused to marry me."
+
+Gwen came to a sudden standstill.
+
+"Refused," she repeated, as if she were not quite sure she had heard
+aright.
+
+"Yes, plain, ungarnished, unmistakable refusal."
+
+"Little idiot!" said Gwen, "what's she dreaming of!"
+
+"I don't know, but she was at considerable pains to impress upon me that
+even medicine bottles and that beastly dispensary were preferable to
+Mourne Lodge with me."
+
+Gwen made a curious whistling sound with her lips--again not in the
+least what one would expect from a young lady mentioned in fashionable
+papers, and sat down beside Lawrence looking quite subdued.
+
+"Well, don't look so blue," she said presently.  "Where there's a will
+there's a way.  What are you going to do?"
+
+"I'm going to win."
+
+"That's right.  Never say die.  I expect you've taken her rather too
+much by surprise.  I'm quite sure when I last saw Paddy, it had never
+entered her head for a moment that you cared a fig about her except to
+tease.  Give her time to come round a bit.  It sounds like playing a
+salmon, doesn't it?  I'm sure it will be heaps more interesting than if
+she'd said `yes' right away, and you'll both care more in the end.
+That's what I tell Bob sometimes.  I was much too easily won, and I want
+to go back and begin again, I just dropped right off the tree into his
+hands like an over-ripe cherry.  Disgusting to think of--isn't it?  I
+ought to have let him mope and pine a bit, and pretended I didn't care.
+Only I'd have been so horribly afraid he thought I meant it, and gone
+off, or something.  I guess that sort of thing is all very fine to talk
+about and in story books, but when it comes to pretending you don't like
+a man, when you're just dying to have him all for your own--why it isn't
+human nature.  Them's my sentiments!"
+
+Lawrence could not help smiling, but it was poor enough comfort for him,
+though before they separated Gwen did really cheer him a little by her
+determined hopefulness and sanguinity.
+
+With Paddy, however, she did not get on in the matter quite so well as
+she had expected.  At the very first allusion Paddy simply drew back
+into herself, and refused to be coaxed or cajoled into uttering a single
+word.  Gwen tried several times and then had to give in.
+
+"Oh, well, if you won't, you won't," she said.  "I always thought I took
+the biscuit for pure, downright obstinacy, but I hand it on to you now."
+
+Lawrence himself did not come to London until the end of October, having
+decided it was best not to be in too great a hurry, and he had better
+have a turn at the pheasants first.  When he came he stayed with the
+Grant-Carews, and it was here he met Paddy through a little subterfuge
+of Gwen's.
+
+"My poppa and momma," she wrote to Paddy, "are going to a terrible,
+overpowering, grand-turk, political luncheon party, to which flighty
+young persons like myself are not admitted, but have to remain at home
+alone and bear the weight of the distinction of belonging to some one
+who has been admitted.  Do be a dear girl and come and bear the weight
+with me.  With your company and a liberal supply of De Brei's chocolates
+I anticipate getting through the afternoon all right.  In case of
+accidents, however, I may just mention the fact of our loneliness to one
+of His Majesty's Horse Guards, but you will have no occasion to be
+uneasy anyway--_Comprenez_?"
+
+Paddy accepted the invitation, but as Gwen fluttered across the
+drawing-room to receive her, her quick eyes instantly descried in the
+far window the back of a well-cut masculine coat, that was somehow
+familiar.
+
+"Who is here?" she asked at once.
+
+"Only Lawrence," said Gwen, in the most casual fashion.  "He is staying
+with us.  Didn't I tell you?"
+
+Paddy made no reply.  The plot was too apparent, but this very fact put
+her on her mettle, and helped her more than anything else would have
+done.
+
+"How do you do?" she said to him, trying to seem perfectly at ease.  "I
+thought you were shooting pheasants in Suffolk."
+
+"So I was until both they and the shooting grew too tame."
+
+"That's his way of saying his aim was either too sure, or too wide, I
+don't know which," put in Gwen.  "Or possibly he got into one of his
+bear-like moods and no one could put up with him, so they sent him on to
+us.  Have you ever seen Lawrence when he's like a bear with a sore
+head?" running on.  "He's just lovely!  I think that's my favourite of
+all his hundred-and-one moods.  Most people are afraid of him, which is
+silly.  If you don't care a fig, and do a little bear-baiting, you can
+get no end of fun out of it.  I wish you would dispose of a few of your
+moods to Bob, Lawrie.  I'm dreadfully afraid he'll turn out hopelessly
+tame as a husband.  Still he can hardly go on worshipping for a whole
+life-time without a break of some kind.  He's bound to turn cranky one
+day.  Won't it be interesting to see the first symptoms!  That must be
+one of the most entertaining parts about getting married, I think--to
+find out what you each get cranky about, and how you do it."
+
+"I'm afraid you'll keep poor old Bob so busy," said Lawrence, "he'll
+have no time to indulge in cranks for himself."
+
+"Oh, yes, he will.  I like fair play, and I'll see that, he gets his
+chance.  It's only cricket, you know, to let your husband have a good
+old round-up occasionally, and pretend you're much impressed, and all
+that."
+
+She dashed off into another subject.  "What a delicious hat, Patricia!
+Where did you get it?  My! what a swell we are to-day.  Is it all put on
+for me, or for Lawrence?--or have you designs on my poor darling
+Goliath?  Doesn't she look charming, Lawrie?"
+
+"Don't be silly, Gwen," a little crossly.
+
+"Quite charming," said Lawrence quietly, and opened the door for them to
+go down to lunch.
+
+At lunch Gwen plunged into a very sore subject without knowing it.
+
+Paddy was treating Lawrence with polite affability, as if to imply that
+for the sake of what had happened on the mountain, she would, as a
+special concession, at any rate not be rude.  Lawrence was
+lackadaisically entertaining, with his old callous air, when Gwen
+suddenly said:
+
+"Why won't your sister ever come here with you, Paddy?  What a funny
+girl she is.  She seldom goes to see Kathleen and Doreen either."
+
+Paddy looked vexed and uncomfortable, but Gwen ran heedlessly on: "Do
+you know I think she has one of the loveliest faces I've ever seen in my
+life.  I'd like to sit and look at her.  Doesn't she like going out?"
+
+Now it was Paddy's most firm and invincible belief, that the reason
+Eileen had so persistently declined all Owen's friendly overtures and
+invitations, was from nothing in the world but a dread of meeting
+Lawrence.  Of course she no longer fretted--it was easy to see that;
+but, judging from her own staunch heart, Paddy argued to herself that
+though she did not fret, she still remembered, and could not face the
+pain of a single meeting that could easily be avoided.  Consequently a
+great many delightful gaieties had been sacrificed to the old wound.
+And when Paddy called this to mind, her anger with Lawrence's
+heartlessness received fresh fuel.
+
+As a matter of fact, it was not Eileen's reason at all.  When Gwen first
+showed her unmistakable liking for Paddy, and shortly afterward included
+both sisters in an invitation, Eileen had made up her mind resolutely to
+stand aside.  She foresaw that were she once to join in their outings,
+it must inevitably mean fewer invitations for Paddy, as one can always
+be so much more easily asked than two, and as she was not particularly
+fond of gaiety, and would as soon remain at home with her mother, she
+made her decision in the beginning and stood by it, without, however,
+entering into explanations.  Paddy probed her once or twice, and then
+drew her own conclusions.
+
+"She has never been to see me once," Gwen ran on.  "I think it is too
+bad of her."
+
+She seemed to expect Paddy to say something, so Paddy remarked casually:
+"She hates leaving mother alone.  It has always been the same," and then
+she shot a sidelong glance at Lawrence.  The fact that he was calmly
+going on with his lunch without the very smallest symptoms of
+embarrassment, or consciousness, vexed her unreasonably, and she wished
+with all her heart he had not come.  Her polite affability from being
+genuine took a sarcastic turn that was not lost on Lawrence, but he
+deviated in no measure from his unperturbed, lackadaisical serenity.
+
+"He hasn't as much heart as a plaster cast," was Paddy's inward comment,
+which, had she stopped to think of it, showed a distinct lack of
+discernment in herself, considering what he had endured for her on the
+mountain.
+
+Very shortly after lunch they were joined by the redoubtable Guardsman,
+who captivated Paddy at once, with the delightful boyishness that
+somehow mingled so irresistibly with his splendid proportions, and his
+almost pathetic devotion to Gwen--who dubbed him alternately, the Babe,
+or the Giant, or Goliath.
+
+"We're all going for a walk in the park now," she informed her assembled
+guests, "and then, perhaps, we'll have tea at the `Hyde Park Hotel,' and
+Paddy can go back to her precious bottles."
+
+Paddy could only acquiesce, and of course Gwen and her giant were very
+quickly steaming ahead, with that expression of blissful satisfaction
+which is to be seen in the very backs of some amorous couples.
+
+Paddy once more commenced to converse with affable politeness to her
+somewhat incommunicative companion.
+
+At last her small stock of patience gave out.
+
+"It's your turn now," she said a trifle witheringly.  "I've thought of
+the last half-dozen remarks."
+
+Lawrence gave a low laugh.  "I hope you don't want me to think they were
+any strain," he said.
+
+Of course no self-respecting daughter of an Irish Fusilier could stand
+that.  "I wished to be polite," she retorted, "so I tried to suit my
+remarks to my company."
+
+"Then I wonder you don't discourse on villains, and ogres, and
+blood-thirsty monsters, and that sort of thing."
+
+"I am quite sorry I couldn't," with a little snort.  "Only inane
+platitudes seemed adaptable."
+
+Again Lawrence laughed.
+
+"You're a stunner at repartee, Paddy.  I never knew such a fighter in my
+life.  First it was fists, then feet, and now it's tongue."
+
+"I am Irish," with naive simplicity.
+
+"So am I, but it doesn't make me want to lay every one out in about
+half-an-hour."
+
+"Of course not," scornfully.  "You are the sort of Irishman who goes
+about the world getting your countrymen a bad name.  You only shine when
+you are doing what you ought not."
+
+"Another injustice to Ireland," with mock pathos--adding: "and when you
+shoot barbed arrows, and fiery glances broadcast, with a reckless
+indifference to inflicting hurt, you are shining at doing what you
+ought--is that it?"
+
+"Oh, don't be an idiot!" with impatience.  "You make an effort at being
+polite now, and talk sense."
+
+"But if being polite rests in suiting one's conversation to one's
+companion?" significantly.
+
+"Then we won't be polite," laughing in spite of herself.  "You can be
+natural and talk drivel, and I'll be warlike."  She glanced round the
+park with a sudden expression, half-longing, and half-humorous--"Heaven!
+how I wish we could go ratting!" she said.
+
+But before they parted they had one of their old tussles.  Lawrence
+suddenly taxed her with looking pale and tired: "Are you ill?" he asked.
+"Is it that beastly dispensary?"
+
+"I was never so well in my life before," obstinately.
+
+"I know better.  You see, I've known you every single bit of your life,
+so I'm in a position to judge."
+
+"You have not," with flat contradiction.  She felt instinctively he was
+getting lover-like, and felt she must repress him at any cost.
+
+"How have I not?  I certainly knew you when you were a month old.  I was
+offered the supreme privilege of carrying you round the garden, but you
+were so like a black-beetle I funked it."
+
+"There were the three years when you were abroad," with a show of
+indifference.
+
+"Ah, to be sure, I didn't know you then."  He smiled a little--that old
+whimsical smile.  "Had I done so there would probably have been no
+second trip abroad, and no deadly feud, and Mourne Lodge might have had
+a second Boadicea rampaging through its stately rooms as mistress."
+
+She quickened her steps.  "I must get my 'bus now, or I shall be late.
+It is no use attempting to attract the attention of Gwen and her giant."
+
+"You bring me down to earth with such thuds," with a plaintive air.  "I
+dream of stately halls, and modern heroines gracing ancient shrines, and
+you annihilate both the vision and the poetry in one merciless blow,
+metaphorically flinging a Shepherd's Bush 'bus at my head.  As it is
+quite out of the question for me to inflict myself upon the lovers, I
+must take you home in a taxi."
+
+"I am going in a 'bus," willfully.  "If you want a cab drive, go to your
+club," and she turned her steps resolutely toward the road.
+
+"I see you mean to be unmanageable--but I can wait--my time will come.
+If I see you getting pale and ill-looking, it will come sooner than you
+think."
+
+"I don't think at all.  I haven't time--at least not to think of you.
+My bottles and prescriptions interest me far more."
+
+"Liar," he murmured humorously--looking hard into her face--and her
+mobile mouth twitched irresistibly as she crossed the road to her 'bus.
+
+She climbed on the top to get the air, in spite of the moist November
+atmosphere, and though she had been spirited to the last with Lawrence,
+her heart grew heavy as they trundled down Notting Hill toward the
+enveloping greyness of Shepherd's Bush, and she wondered if she had been
+wise to go.  It was not the first time that Paddy had had misgivings
+about the wisdom of seeing much of Gwen.  She always hated the
+commonplace, middle-class streets so afterward, the stuffy little
+dispensary, with its rows of foolish, inane-looking jars, and monotonous
+medicine bottles; the hopeless mediocrity of her whole surroundings.  At
+moments she longed passionately to be with Jack galloping over the grass
+plains of the Argentine; and her heart was sore at the fate which had
+condemned her of all people to mixing medicines in a dingy suburb.  She
+even ruminated a little wistfully, if only Lawrence had not been
+Lawrence.  If some other man had lived at Mourne Lodge, and wanted her
+to make her home there, what a heaven on earth she might have had!  Or
+if even Lawrence had been different--and there had been no dividing
+memory.  How strange it seemed that he should combine such charm with
+such heartlessness.  She understood better now, how it was Eileen had
+become a victim.  It was natural enough, since it had pleased him to
+please her.  But she knew more of the other side, had known it all
+along, through her greater friendship with his sisters.  Only that
+morning, in a letter from home, Doreen had written: "Lawrence has been
+shooting pheasants in Suffolk.  Long may he stay there.  Before he went,
+and just after you left the Parsonage he was in one of his most bearish
+moods.  If he wasn't sullen he was cutting.  He either sulked or sneered
+till we were sick of him in the house.  Of course Kathleen quarrelled
+with him about the way he spoke to mother, which is so silly of her, as
+mother understands him, and doesn't really take any notice; whereas
+Kathleen ends in making us all miserable.  However, he had the goodness
+to take himself off after the 12th, and it's been peaceful ever since."
+
+Paddy stared into the greyness.  Of course Eileen had been spared; such
+a nature must surely have broken her heart--but that was no excuse
+whatever--merely a reflection.
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY NINE.
+
+A CHRISTMAS SURPRISE.
+
+The few weeks to Christmas passed uneventfully.  The Blakes came to
+London and Lawrence joined them, and they all seemed to slip back into
+their old groove for the time being.  Paddy came and went much the same
+as before, and Lawrence strove to possess his soul in patience.  Once
+more he resorted to subterfuge to find out when she was likely to be
+coming, and in general she succeeded in outwitting him.  If she was half
+expected he would sit in his smoke-room with the door ajar, and listen
+to hear if the stately James opened the door to a familiar voice.  If
+she came he would casually join them all at tea.  If she did not he went
+to his club.  Once he inveigled her into the sanctum itself.  That was a
+red-letter day.  He went downstairs to see her out, and in the hall told
+her in a voice of most disarming naturalness, that he had a beautiful
+little setter pup in his room--wouldn't she like to see it?
+
+Paddy hesitated, and was lost.
+
+She could never resist dogs.  The little creature was in a basket near
+the fireplace, and she took it up in undisguised delight, going eagerly
+over its points with him.  Then she put it back and turned to the door.
+
+"Don't hurry," in that same disarming voice.  "There are a good many
+things that will interest you here, if you will only look at them."
+
+Paddy murmured something about the dispensary, with one eye on the door,
+and the other on a model yacht.  With great diplomacy Lawrence turned
+his head away, and said simply, "Oh, well, another time perhaps."
+
+Paddy said: "Is that a model of the _Shamrock_?  What a little beauty it
+is!"
+
+They went over the points of the yacht, and she became engrossed in it.
+Then she suddenly made an unaccountable movement for the door.  It had
+dawned on her that she was parleying with the enemy.  That the enemy was
+dangerously alluring.  Feeling a little mad with herself, she made her
+exit ungracefully.  A jerky good-by--a feeble explanation of her sudden
+haste--and she was gone.
+
+Then Lawrence smiled.  His extremely wide and varied experience with the
+opposite sex had made him correspondingly wise.  In that moment he saw
+victory in sight.  Far enough away still, perhaps, but yet there.  It
+was becoming a duel of wills.  To him it was his strength of will and
+personality, against her fanaticism.  He had chosen a strong word, but
+fallen short in grasping all it involved.  How many a strong will has
+been worsted even by a weak fanatic!  How many a weak will, under the
+influence of fanaticism has achieved the deeds of the strong!
+
+He knew that day that in some way she was not wholly indifferent to him.
+He believed she was just a little bit afraid, and that, to him, was the
+sweetest thought of all.
+
+Paddy hurried home, and wondered why she had been so stupidly weak as to
+go and see the puppy.  She was genuinely vexed, and the incident had the
+present result of making her absent herself longer than usual, and be
+more difficult, when at last she came.
+
+Lawrence went to his store of understanding, and said: "She has
+discovered that she is afraid."
+
+Then Christmas approached.  It had been arranged for Mrs Adair, and
+Eileen, and Paddy to cross to Omeath for a week, somewhat to the
+latter's surprise, for it seemed to her extremely rash for Eileen and
+her mother to take such a journey at that time of the year.  However,
+her remonstrances were quickly swept aside, and the plans made.  Then
+came a letter from Aunt Jane begging Mrs Adair and Eileen to start a
+week before Christmas, and if Paddy could not come with them, for her to
+follow on Christmas eve.  To Paddy's amazement Mrs Adair immediately
+showed signs of consenting.  For one moment it was almost a shock to
+her--it seemed so strange that they should go off like that without her,
+when they knew she could not possibly go before Christmas eve.  Seeing
+her mute surprise, her mother hastened to explain that the aunties had a
+very special reason for wishing it, and then Paddy decided there was
+something in the air of which she was entirely ignorant.  A year ago she
+would have promptly asked innumerable questions, but somehow a secret in
+her own life had raised a dim barrier between her and her mother and
+sister, and she felt, with a vague sense of loneliness, that, perhaps,
+they likewise had a secret they kept from her.  She made no demur about
+their hurried departure, but kissed them good-by with a bright face,
+though something in her eyes made Eileen remark as the train steamed out
+of Euston:
+
+"It's rather too bad, mother, isn't it?"
+
+"She will understand all right on Christmas Day," Mrs Adair answered,
+and a beautiful colour stole over Eileen's face.
+
+Beyond doubt, as Paddy had conjectured, there was something in the wind.
+There were two others, however, who were much pleased by the
+arrangement, namely, Gwendoline and Lawrence.
+
+"It's just capital, isn't it?"  Gwen exclaimed.  "Now you'll have to
+take Paddy over on Christmas eve."
+
+Lawrence said little, but Gwen saw a light come into his eyes that he
+could not altogether hide.  Paddy at first was vexed, and showed it.
+
+"Don't be an idiot," quoth Gwen.  "Why, it stands to reason it's
+pleasanter to have an escort for a long, cold, dark journey like that,
+and Lawrence is splendid to travel with.  He just looks after you all
+the time and doesn't bother to talk.  I shall come and fetch you in the
+brougham in the afternoon and go to Euston, and see you both off
+myself."
+
+She did so, and Paddy's good aunt was immensely impressed by the
+magnificence of the livery and horses of the equipage, that drew up in
+the dingy Shepherd's Bush street that December afternoon, outside the
+doctor's highly coloured front door.  Gwen herself she only saw dimly
+through the drawing-room curtains, inside the brougham, but even that
+glimpse so impressed her that for several days the church guilds and
+things had a rest, in favour of this vision from the far-off fashionable
+world.
+
+Paddy took it all very coolly.  She did not even wear her best hat,
+which greatly scandalised her aunt, but as Paddy explained, it was too
+heavy on her forehead to travel in and the other would do quite as well.
+
+When they reached Euston, Lawrence was waiting, having artfully reached
+the station first in order to procure not only their tickets, but, by a
+substantial tip, the first-class compartment for themselves.
+
+"What! here already!" cried Gwen.  "Ye gods and fishes, is the world
+coming to an end!  Mark it down on your cuff, Lawrence, that you once
+caught a train with five minutes to spare, instead of leisurely
+strolling up after it was already on the move, and having to scramble
+into the guard's van."
+
+Lawrence took no notice.
+
+"Do you prefer the dining-car or dinner baskets?" he asked Paddy.
+
+"I don't need either, thanks.  I never feel hungry on a journey."
+
+"Have the baskets, Lawrie," said Gwen.  "Then you are not tied to any
+time, and you don't have the bother of going to the restaurant car."
+
+Paddy turned away.  "I must get my ticket," said she.
+
+Gwen looked highly amused.  Indeed the whole performance was tickling
+her so, she could hardly refrain from bursting out laughing at the two
+of them.
+
+"I took the liberty of getting your ticket when I got my own," said
+Lawrence.  "I thought it would save you the trouble."
+
+Paddy murmured a word of thanks, and opened her purse.
+
+"How much do I owe you!" she asked.
+
+Lawrence caught the gleam in Gwen's eyes, and could not help an
+answering gleam.
+
+"I'm not quite sure," he said.  "May we leave it for the present?"
+
+A little demon possessed Gwen.  "Don't forget the tips for the porters
+when you're settling-up," she said.
+
+Paddy looked rather black, and Lawrence had to turn away to buy some
+papers.
+
+"You are a wretch, Gwen," said Paddy.  "You know perfectly well you
+wouldn't let anyone pay for you."
+
+"Oh! wouldn't I!" with emphasis.  "I'd just think how jolly lucky I was
+to be all that much to the good."
+
+Lawrence came back with his arm full of illustrated magazines.
+
+"Nothing like plenty of literature to keep one from getting dull," said
+Gwen wickedly.  "But my! won't it complicate the settling-up!"
+
+A guard came along and told Lawrence they would be starting in two
+minutes, and so obsequious and marked was his deference that Gwen was
+again taken with an unaccountable spasm of amusement.
+
+"You scoundrel, Lawrence," she murmured, in an aside, "that cost you
+nothing short of a sovereign."
+
+Lawrence pretended not to hear, but led the way to their compartment and
+placed the magazines on the seat.  Paddy was thoughtful a moment, and
+again a little black.
+
+"I don't want to travel first," she said.  "I can't afford it.  Let us
+meet at Holyhead and cross on the steamer together."
+
+"It's a pity to waste the ticket," said Lawrence, "and the thirds are so
+crowded.  Besides there is no time now."
+
+"No, they're just off," put in Gwen quickly.  "Good-by, Paddy.  Sorry I
+can't be in for that settling-up.  I'm so afraid Lawrence will cheat
+you.  Have a good time.  See you on Thursday," and a few seconds later
+the train was steaming out of the station.
+
+Gwen's last remark with reference to Thursday was an allusion to a visit
+she and her adoring Goliath were paying to the Blakes in a few days.
+They were to have gone over with Lawrence, but at the last her parents
+refused to part with her for Christmas Day, and they were not starting
+till the twenty-seventh.
+
+"It will be lovely to have Gwen in Ireland," Paddy said, as they settled
+themselves, "but she ought to have paid her first visit in the summer."
+
+Lawrence gave a little laugh.
+
+"I don't suppose the seasons make much difference to people in her and
+Bob's happy state of mind.  It's just likely she will hardly know
+whether it is December or July,"--then he proceeded to shake out his
+big, warm rug and tuck it all round Paddy.
+
+She tried to remonstrate, but she might as well have talked to the rug.
+
+"I won't worry you the whole way if you're good, Paddy," he said, with a
+smile, in which there was a touch of wistfulness; "but you'll just have
+to let me take care of you; it would be any man's right who had known
+you as long as I have."
+
+She coloured and lowered her eyes, but made no further demur.  When he
+was satisfied he had done everything possible, and again sat down, she
+opened one of the papers, and buried her face in it, pretending to be
+carefully studying the illustrations.  But in reality something of a
+tumult was stirring in her heart.  It was so good to be taken care of--
+poor Paddy.  The way her mother and Eileen had gone on ahead had hurt
+her more than any one knew, and Lawrence's careful attentions only made
+her feel the contrast.  If it had only been Jack--or indeed anyone but
+Lawrence.
+
+He had opened a paper also and now sat quietly reading opposite to her,
+not attempting to worry her with conversation.  Once or twice Paddy
+ventured to glance covertly into his thin, keen face after discovering
+she could do so without his knowledge.
+
+She was wondering a little why, occasionally of late, she had
+experienced a wholly new and unaccountable sensation, something like
+dread.  How could she be afraid?... she the fearless!  Was it the subtle
+suggestion of strength?  Hardly so, for Ted Masterman was no less
+strong, and she had never had any anxious qualms with him, nor remotest
+suggestion of loss of self-confidence.  Was it the thin, cynical lips!
+Was it the something indescribable that suggested unscrupulousness?  In
+repose it was not a reassuring face.  The mouth was a little cruel, the
+jaw had an obstinate set, and there were fine lines of irritability
+round the keen eyes.  Only when he smiled was there real charm, and even
+then it depended on the measure of his wish to please; though, because
+his smile was rare, it was invariably attractive.
+
+Paddy watched him covertly, feeling interested.  She realised that he
+had the look of a man who could not be thwarted with impunity.  A man
+strong enough to be patient up to a certain point, and then capable of
+being unscrupulous rather than give in.  She wished vaguely that he had
+been different, and at that moment, before she had time to lower her
+gaze, Lawrence looked up suddenly from his paper straight into her eyes.
+
+There was no time for subterfuge, and a sudden flood of colour in her
+cheeks told its own tale.
+
+Lawrence smiled his sudden, fascinating smile, and resting his arms
+across his knees, leaned toward her.
+
+"What were you thinking about, Patricia!"
+
+"Nothing," said Paddy, and shut her mouth with a little snap.
+
+"Come!" coaxingly, "you may as well tell me."
+
+But she would not be inveigled, and picked up her papers again, saying
+that she had forgotten.  Lawrence, however, was not so easily put off.
+
+"Do you know you have such a funny mouth, Paddy," he said.  "It doesn't
+shut properly, and when you want to be very firm you have to use great
+pressure.  It almost looks as if it had a spring that didn't work quite
+properly, and sometimes, although you are very determined to be severe,
+it persists in getting unmanageable and twitching.  It's quite the most
+fascinating, irresistible mouth I ever saw in my life."
+
+"Don't be silly," trying not to see how altogether engaging his manner
+had become.  "In about two seconds I shall put up my umbrella."
+
+"Don't do that," he laughed.  "It would be too unkind.  I don't mind
+your firing bombs at me in your conversation, but I should mind very
+much if you hid yourself."
+
+"That is the reason that would have more weight with me than any other
+for doing so," promptly.
+
+Lawrence sat back and laughed outright.
+
+"Clean bowled!" he said.  "'Pon my word, Paddy, there's no getting in
+edgeways with you."
+
+"Give up trying," dryly.  "Read a book and improve your mind instead."
+
+"Does it need it so badly?"
+
+"Never too old to learn," without looking up.
+
+"You needn't say it as if I were your grandfather.  I'm only
+thirty-five, and what are you?  Let me see, Doreen is twenty-five, and
+you are eighteen months younger, therefore you must be either
+twenty-three or twenty-four.  Time you were growing wiser, Paddy, and
+suiting yourself to your world, and its exigencies."
+
+"I suppose you mean _your_ world!"
+
+"Mine and yours.  It's got to come some day, Patricia.  Why not now?"
+
+She shut her lips more tightly, and pretended to be buried in her paper.
+
+"You can't possibly know what you are reading about.  Put the paper down
+and talk for a little.  You will only damage your eyesight."
+
+Still no answer.
+
+He ventured further.  "Do you remember the last time we were alone in a
+small space between four walls at this hour!"
+
+She put the paper down suddenly, and looked straight into his eyes.
+"You are not playing fair," she said.
+
+He sat up quickly, and drew his hand across his face, and then said
+quite simply: "You are right.  I apologise."
+
+Paddy was instantly mollified, and he saw it, and took the opportunity
+to get up and rearrange her rug.
+
+"It is all right," she urged, but he only smiled, and persisted in
+tucking her up more cozily.  Once again Paddy had that fleeting sense of
+the satisfaction of masculine protection, and looked a little wistfully
+down at her book.
+
+"If I promise to play fair, will you talk?" he asked.  "It is so tiring
+to read."
+
+She could not but agree with him, and they spent the rest of the journey
+talking about Lawrence's travels, and the wonders of far-off lands.
+When he would take the trouble he was a delightful conversationalist,
+and Paddy gave an exclamation of astonishment when she found they were
+nearing Holyhead.
+
+Lawrence smiled inwardly, but was far too clever to mar his momentary
+triumph by seeming to notice it, and they remained good friends until
+the train steamed into Omeath station.
+
+Paddy, of course, was hanging out of the window, watching for each
+familiar landmark, but when the train drew up, she uttered an
+exclamation of such boundless amazement, incredulity, and delight
+mingled, that Lawrence was quite startled.
+
+Coming running down the platform was Jack O'Hara.
+
+CHAPTER FORTY.
+
+A BUDGET OF NEWS.
+
+Paddy was out on the platform in half a twinkling, and with a little cry
+of "Jack!" darted to meet him with hands outstretched.  Jack caught hold
+of both, and shook them until she was quite exhausted, and cried for
+mercy.  Lawrence stood looking on, and his brow grew black as thunder.
+If Jack had only known it, in that one minute he had practically all the
+revenge he need wish, for any fancied contempt in the past.
+
+"Can I give you a lift?"  Lawrence said, when they would listen.  "My
+motor is here.  How do, O'Hara!  You look as if South America suited
+you."
+
+"It did A1," answered Jack, not even noticing Lawrence's ill-concealed
+anger--as indeed he had small occasion to.  "What shall we do, Paddy,
+walk or drive?"
+
+"Oh, ride on the back of the train, of course!" she cried, "and home
+through the garden, just like we did as children.  Oh, Jack, I've had to
+be so grown-up for two years.  I absolutely refuse to be grown-up this
+Christmas holiday--we will--we _must_ be children."
+
+"Anything you like," he cried, with the utmost readiness.  "Come along,"
+as the train moved.  "Send up Miss Paddy's portmanteau.  Good-by,
+Lawrence!" and they sprang on to the step of the guard's van and rode
+the short distance of railway to the Parsonage garden, leaving Lawrence
+to go home in the most unenviable frame of mind imaginable, which he
+later vented upon the household generally in his cold and cutting
+fashion, regardless of the fact that he was damping every one's
+Christmas.
+
+But what cared Jack and Paddy?--least of all Paddy--for whom a joy
+seemed to have dropped straight from, the skies.  What a noise there
+was, to be sure! and how Jack and Paddy _would_ talk at once, and make
+it impossible for any single sentence to be coherent.
+
+At last, in desperation, Paddy picked up the little table-bell and rang
+it lustily.  "If I can't be heard, you shan't, Jack," she said, and, the
+moment he opened his mouth, started ringing it again.  Jack immediately
+flew round the table to get the bell, and behold! if the two little
+ladies weren't collecting the breakables again, and casting agonising
+glances at the cups and saucers and plates on the breakfast-table--just
+for all the world as if two long years of separation had not rolled by
+since the last scrimmage, and these two mad things were not a day older.
+If Paddy had not been in such a state of eager excitement, she must
+certainly have noticed sooner than she did an air of portent that still
+prevailed, as of some momentous event not yet revealed.
+
+As it was, they all went to the little church as usual, Jack and the
+aunties sitting one side, and the Adairs on the other side, for the sake
+of old times; and came home again, and had their Christmas dinner,
+before Paddy got an inkling that further news was in the air.  Up to
+then the whole conversation nearly had run upon Jack's adventures in the
+Argentine, and she had plied him with such an endless string of
+questions that there had really not been much opportunity for any other
+subject.
+
+After dinner, however, they collected round a big log fire for a cozy
+afternoon, and a few minutes later a letter and parcel arrived by hand
+for Paddy.  Both were from Doreen Blake, the parcel containing a
+handsome Christmas present, and the letter a piece of news that made her
+give a little exclamation of pleased surprise.
+
+"Only fancy!" she cried.  "Doreen Blake is engaged.  What fun!  How I
+wonder what he is like!"
+
+The others looked up with interest.
+
+"Evidently he has come over for Christmas, and it is only just settled,"
+Paddy ran on.  "I am pleased.  Dear old Dorrie.  He is a barrister, and
+they met last September, in Scotland.  Really, engagements seem to be in
+the air.  First Gwen Carew, then Doreen--and now I wonder who will be
+the third."
+
+A kind of subdued murmur made her look up quickly, and something about
+Jack and Eileen caught her attention for the first time.  In spite of
+herself, it sent a little chill to her heart.  She folded her letter and
+sat down on the floor, leaning against Aunt Jane's lap.
+
+"Now," she remarked, "I'm ready to be told why Jack has come home in
+this unexpected manner.  You don't any of you seem to have been very
+communicative so far."
+
+"I like that!" exclaimed Jack, "when you haven't given anybody a chance
+to get a word in edgeways all day--but there! you always did monopolise
+the whole conversation."
+
+"You've come back more uppish than ever, Jack," she retorted.  "Anybody
+would think you had come in; for a fortune at least."
+
+This seemed to tickle them all quite unnecessarily, and Jack burst into
+a hearty laugh.
+
+"You all seem rather easily amused," said Paddy, "or else I am getting
+very dense.  What is the joke?"
+
+"Only that you fired a shot at random and made a bull's-eye," laughed
+Jack.
+
+Paddy looked more puzzled than ever, but suddenly she leaned forward and
+exclaimed:
+
+"You don't mean that you have come in for a fortune, Jack?"
+
+"Not exactly," he answered, "only a trifle of 20,000 pounds."
+
+"_You've_ got 20,000 pounds?" incredulously.
+
+"Yes.  An obliging relative of my mother's, I had scarcely heard of,
+died a little while ago and left no other heirs but me."
+
+For a moment Paddy was too astonished to speak, and they all watched her
+with eager happiness in their eyes.  Undoubtedly there was more to come.
+At last she looked up with a twinkle.
+
+"My! if you'd only had it a bit sooner, Jack," she said, "we might have
+bought up all the chocolate in Mrs White's shop, and all the
+bull's-eyes, and all the licorice.  Goodness! what a feast we would have
+had."
+
+"We'll do lots better than that," he cried.  "We'll have new boats, and
+new rifles, and new fishing-rods."
+
+"I'm thinking that isn't quite what brought Jack home after all,"
+remarked Miss Jane.
+
+"Ask Eileen," said Jack, in a way that made Eileen blush.
+
+"What, more secrets!" cried Paddy.  "It seems to me you'd better just
+start at the beginning, and tell me everything that has been going on
+behind my back in this barefaced fashion."
+
+"Yes, only unfortunately we don't quite know where the beginning is, do
+we, Eileen?"
+
+"It's too bad, Paddy, to tease you so," put in Eileen quickly.  "The
+real truth is that last summer, when you didn't happen to be at home to
+see, letters from the Argentine began to come much oftener, and were not
+handed round for public perusal as usual.  And then--You go on Jack,"
+smiling at him.
+
+"And then," said Jack readily enough, "some one wanted desperately to go
+along with the letters, and for some time could not find a way.  At
+last, some one wrote and asked if he might come if he could find ways
+and means, and all unbeknown to every one but themselves, letter-writer
+and recipient arranged a little plan, if they could only manage to bring
+it off.  While still in doubt as to ways and means, distant relative
+most obligingly dies, and then it is hey presto! and catch the next
+boat."
+
+Paddy crossed the fireside circle in a flash, and flung herself upon
+Eileen.
+
+"Oh, Eily, Eily," she cried, "you are engaged?--are you really engaged
+to Jack?"
+
+"Yes, Paddy," and her voice and eyes spoke all she could not say.
+
+"Oh, I'm so glad, I'm so glad, I feel as if I must just hug you both!
+and the aunties too, and every one.  What a lovely Christmas present, a
+new brother."
+
+"But that isn't really all," cried Jack.  "We're going to live at The
+Ghan House.  Only think of it! and you and your mother are to have the
+west wing all to yourselves, and live there with us just as long as ever
+you will."
+
+After that every one joined in, and the rest of the afternoon was spent
+in discussing numerous projects, interesting to all alike.  Paddy joined
+in likewise with seeming eagerness, but deep down in her heart, minute
+by minute, a certain dragging weight made itself more and more apparent.
+She would not for worlds have said so yet, for fear she might damp
+their happiness, but she knew quite well she would not go and live at
+The Ghan House with Jack and Eileen.  An indefinable something, she
+hardly knew what, made her shrink instinctively and very certainly from
+such an arrangement.  No, she would prefer to go back to her dispensing,
+and be independent, even if it was London, and she had to go alone.
+
+There were tears on Paddy's eyelashes that night when she fell asleep.
+It seemed to her as if a sudden, most unlooked-for weight of loneliness
+were crushing her, and her whole soul longed and longed for the father
+sleeping quietly in the churchyard close beside her.  She did not for
+one moment grudge Jack and Eileen their happiness--only just at first,
+just until she had got used to the new order and readjusted her own
+feelings a little--it was not easy to rejoice without one single qualm
+of painful remembrance.
+
+The following day a lively call from Doreen and her _fiance_ on
+horseback cheered her considerably and helped her still better to hide
+everything from the rest; and the day after there was a little teasing
+and good-humoured raillery about a parcel from South Africa which had
+been forwarded from England.  It contained a beautiful white
+ostrich-feather boa, and there was a delightful letter with it, begging
+her to accept it as a Christmas token, all of which told its own tale of
+constancy and steady persistence on the part of the lonely Englishman
+exiled there, and still dreaming of her when he had time to dream at
+all.  Jack made most of such an opportunity and gave her little peace,
+and Paddy took it in excellent part, because she was glad of anything
+that would help to blind them to a certain circumstance nearer home.
+
+In the evening they had one of their wild "scrimmage" parties, for the
+sake of old times, and to every one's astonishment, Lawrence arrived
+with the Mourne Lodge party.  He had, of course, heard the news, and
+professed to have accepted his invitation for the express purpose of
+congratulating the happy pair.  This certainly was open to doubt, though
+the genuineness of his congratulations was equally certainly not so.
+
+Paddy fought shy of him from the first moment, and as she was naturally
+the ringleader of the scrimmage party, whereas he played Bridge in the
+study, it was perfectly easy to avoid an encounter.  Only, as it
+happened, for that evening at least, Fortune was on Lawrence's side.
+The scrimmage party were playing a game in which one of their number had
+to go out of the room, and it chanced to be Paddy's turn just when
+Lawrence, being "dummy," strolled into the hall for a smoke.
+
+Before she knew of his presence, he had walked up to her and said:
+"Paddy, do you know you are sitting under the mistletoe?"
+
+Paddy gave a start, blushed in a way that made her inwardly furious, and
+moved to the other end of the oak chest upon which she had been seated.
+
+"You needn't be so haughty," he laughed.  "You know perfectly well I've
+kissed you lots of times, only unfortunately it was when I didn't want
+to.  I remember once the master scolding me because I made such a point
+of kissing Eileen, and ignoring you.  I argued that you were such an
+ugly little brute, and invented the fable that you hated kissing."
+
+"It was no fable."
+
+"Wasn't it?" humorously.  "Nature never gave a mouth like that to a
+woman who hated kissing.  Some day I'll remind you of that, Paddy."
+
+"I loathed you," she remarked, refusing to be drawn.  "You were the most
+objectionable, bad-tempered, conceited little beast that ever wore a
+silly little top hat and Eton suit."
+
+He laughed with a relish.
+
+"That's better!" approvingly.  "It's impossible not to think there is
+something the matter with you, when you are not dealing out bombs of
+some sort.  Why were you looking so woebegone when I came from the
+study, out here all alone in the hall?"
+
+"I was not looking woebegone."
+
+"Oh, yes, you were--just as if I shouldn't know."  There was a pause,
+then he said with unexpected gentleness: "You were thinking about Eileen
+and O'Hara getting engaged, and you being left out in the cold."  He put
+his hand on hers suddenly: "Mavourneen," he said in a voice of
+enthralling softness, "you were lonesome."
+
+For one moment she left her hand in his, and then sprang to her feet
+with a bound: "An objectionable, bad-tempered, conceited little beast,
+that's what you were," and she slipped past him back to the
+drawing-room.
+
+Lawrence remained a few seconds longer, and in his face was a strange
+mingling of yearning and satisfaction.  That one moment had been passing
+sweet, the very most he had had to encourage him all through--yet how it
+made him hunger for more!  And she had looked sad when he found her, he
+had seen it distinctly--the little droop about the lips--the little air
+of unwonted thoughtfulness.
+
+Ah! she must come now--there must be no more delay--surely with Eileen's
+engagement a recognised fact he could make headway at last.  Surely this
+was the moment to strike hard.  He would take his opportunity.
+
+There were again tears on Paddy's lashes that night, and she tossed
+restlessly.  She shut her eyes, and shut her ears, and tried to shut her
+mind--but nothing would wholly drown those few words, coming as they did
+in her first hours of loneliness--nor the ravishing sweetness of the
+tones: "Mavourneen, you were lonesome."
+
+It was like a spell upon her.  Some unreal enchantment that possessed
+her spirit.  Of course it must be broken.  Things could not go as they
+were.  Once for all she must _make_ him see the uselessness of his
+quest, and it must be soon.  That Eileen was healed and comforted did
+not make the smallest difference.  The past was still the past.  The
+handwriting still glowed on the wall.  Over his coveted happiness--over
+any happiness for them together--was writ large the sentence of old:
+"Tekel--Found Wanting."
+
+In this mood, and feeling very resolute, Paddy started out two days
+later, to deliver judgment.
+
+CHAPTER FORTY ONE.
+
+IN LAWRENCE'S DEN.
+
+It was to a small luncheon party, given especially for the three pairs
+of lovers at Mourne Lodge, that Eileen and Paddy and Jack set out that
+bright, crisp morning.  Gwen and her giant, Doreen and her barrister,
+Eileen and her stalwart rancher--these were the three amorous couples
+whom Lawrence, Kathleen and Paddy had to severally and together keep
+within the bounds of rational dinner-table conversation for a whole
+hour.  After that they were prepared to wash their hands of them and let
+them hide away and discuss delightful nothings to their own delectation
+until tea-time.  Doreen and the pump-handle court representative
+announced their intention of playing billiards, which no one thought it
+worth while to contradict, however sceptical he felt, and anyhow they
+bent their steps in the direction of the billiard-room.  Eileen and Jack
+decided upon a quick walk, and the giant, of course, merely waited
+orders.  At first they seemed to hang fire.  Gwen was manoeuvring in a
+way that certainly meant something, but it was very difficult to tell
+exactly what.  As a matter of fact, she was waiting on the off chance of
+Kathleen being called away.  Directly the hoped-for call came she was
+prompt to act.
+
+"Come along, Paddy," she said, putting her arm through hers; "let's go
+and rummage round in Lawrence's den.  I think it's just the loveliest
+spot in the whole house!  Did you ever see such a rag-tag and bobtail of
+odds and ends before?  I just love poking round there."  And she led the
+way at once, Lawrence and the giant following.
+
+For several minutes she really did poke round, and then she discovered
+she had lost her handkerchief, and promptly dispatched the giant in
+search.  As he was naturally as close to her as he could be she had no
+difficulty in adding in a tone that he only could hear, "Don't come
+back."  After three minutes she looked up in the most natural way
+imaginable and remarked, "Whatever can Goliath be doing?  My
+handkerchief must be in the dining-room.  Perhaps he can't see so far as
+the floor."
+
+Paddy had seated herself in a large easy-chair, and, scenting nothing of
+the plot, was idly watching the fire.  She had, in consequence, no time
+to realise what was on foot until it was too late.
+
+"I shall have to go and help him search," said Gwen with a pretence at
+annoyance.  "He is a terrible muff at finding any thing."
+
+Whereupon she calmly departed and closed the door behind her, leaving
+Paddy sitting in the big arm-chair, and Lawrence leaning against the
+mantelpiece, looking down at her with an odd little twinkle in his eyes.
+
+In the dining-room Gwen found Kathleen, but she was quite prepared for
+the emergency.
+
+"Where has everybody gone?"  Kathleen asked wonderingly.
+
+"All gone out, I think," Gwen replied unblushingly, and then went off
+with her Giant to the drawing-room, knowing perfectly well Lawrence's
+sisters never went into his den, and that therefore her strategy was
+quite successful.
+
+Meanwhile, when Paddy saw that Gwen had closed the door after her, she
+leaned forward with a doubtful expression and appeared about to follow.
+
+"Don't run away," said Lawrence, "or I shall think you are afraid of
+me."
+
+"I am not afraid of anyone," stoutly, still looking toward the door.
+
+"No, I know you are not.  Still, the others most certainly don't want
+us; we should only be in the way."
+
+It was too true.  Paddy leaned back and stared into the fire, and that
+little droop hovered round her lips again.  Kathleen was sure to be with
+her mother, and the others all dispersed.
+
+"Not even anyone to go ratting with," he said, with a tender little
+smile.
+
+The lips twitched and then settled again to the droop, while she tried
+to reinforce herself for the struggle that loomed ahead.  No use to run
+away now.  The time had come for a final understanding, and it must be
+faced.
+
+Lawrence watched her a little while in silence, and there was absolute
+stillness in the room except for the cheery crackling of the fresh log
+he had just thrown on the fire.
+
+"You look, somehow, as if you were prepared for the worst," he told her,
+smiling.  "Am I such a terrible ogre?"
+
+She did not speak, and he pulled up a chair beside her and sat down,
+holding his thin white hands out to the blaze.
+
+"Do you remember the last time you were in my den?" running on.  "It was
+the night of the girls' `coming-out' dance--the ultimatum, so to speak,
+when you declared war.  I remember it perfectly--I always shall.  You
+were all in white, Paddy--a fluffy kind of dress that suited you,
+admirably.  I remember being surprised to see how pretty you _could_
+look.  But, of course, it was your hair--you had always treated it so
+abominably before.  I sometimes think it is the loveliest hair I have
+ever seen in my life--and I've seen a good deal," with a humorous little
+shrug.  "And then, of course, your eyes are good, and there's the
+fascinating mouth."
+
+Paddy could not resist a smile.  "When you've done going over my
+points?"
+
+"Your points are A1, Patricia," with admiration in his eyes.  "You are a
+thoroughbred to your finger-tips."
+
+"Well, don't be personal, or I shall go.  You know I don't like it."
+
+"No, don't go.  I'll try to be good."
+
+He was silent a moment, and slowly that same air of the previous
+evening, suggestive of sadness, crept over her face again, and there was
+a weariness in her attitude as she sat back watching the flames and
+clasping each arm of the chair with delicate, tapering fingers.
+
+"Paddy," he said simply, "chuck all those foolish doubts and fancies of
+yours, and give in.  I can't bear to see you looking forlorn."
+
+"I will not: I will never give in."
+
+He squared his shoulders unconsciously, and her fingers gripped the arms
+of her chair more tightly.
+
+"You can't help yourself in the end.  Why prolong my suspense?
+Everything is against you.  Even Fate is pairing off the others and
+leaving you and me alone.  I know quite well you are lonely--desperately
+lonely--but it is your own fault.  If you would only be sensible and let
+yourself follow the dictates of your heart, instead of a warped
+conscience, you could be happy with the rest.  I say your heart, because
+somewhere, hidden away, there's a soft corner for me you are afraid of.
+Isn't that so, Paddy!" and he looked searchingly into her face.
+
+She made no reply, staring into the fire with a perplexed, unhappy
+expression.
+
+He put one hand over the fingers nearest him and held them fast.  She
+attempted to draw them away, but he retained his hold, and for the
+moment she went with the flood.
+
+"You have not answered me, mavourneen."
+
+"I have only one answer--I will not give in."
+
+"And I say you will.  This new loneliness has come to help me.  Already
+you are nearer to me than ever before."
+
+She drew a long breath.
+
+"It is only because I see we must come to a real understanding once for
+all.  We can't just go on as we have.  That's chiefly why I remained
+here now.  I want to make you understand."
+
+She sat up and drew her hand away.  "Lawrence, you must leave me in
+peace.  A man cannot honestly want to marry a girl who--who--" Ah! why
+did she falter?
+
+"Well, little woman!  Who--who--!"
+
+"Doesn't love him," a trifle lamely.
+
+"Ah, Paddy! you were going to say `hate,' and the lie died on your
+lips."
+
+She flushed in the firelight, but continued bravely:
+
+"It makes very little difference.  The fact remains that I do not love
+you and I will not marry you."
+
+"Marry me first, and I will soon teach you to love."
+
+She felt her breath coming fitfully and her pulses leaping strangely,
+and she bit her teeth together to steady herself as she still stared
+into the fire.  Oh! why did he give her that unnerved feeling!  What in
+the world was the matter with her!  She felt as if she only waited to
+hide her face in the cushion.  He seemed to understand, for he turned
+his eyes away, and, leaning forward, softly kissed her hand.  "It would
+be difficult, little woman--you were made for love, and I--well, I
+somehow seem to just worship you, and that's all about it."
+
+Once more she tried to rally herself, pressing her hands to her eyes as
+if to shut out everything that distracted her from her one purpose.
+
+"It is no use," resolutely.  "Of course, I understand you have a certain
+power when you like, and that you are so confident because sooner or
+later you have always won.  But that is just what fortifies me now.  I
+don't want to go into the old arguments.  I want you to understand once
+for all that I _am_ fortified, and I _do_ mean what I say, and not all
+the loneliness in the world will change me.  It is no use talking as you
+do, and hoping as you do, because there are barriers which neither of us
+could move, even if we were both agreed.  Be sensible and be kind.  It
+would be kind to leave me alone in future, and sensible to be content
+that you have, to a certain extent, broken down my hate."
+
+"Content!--_content_!" and there was a low, vibrating passion in his
+voice that stirred her to her depths.  "Content to give in when I have
+come within sight of my goal!  Content to lose my wife for a whim--a
+prejudice--a quixotic idea of righting a wrong that, has long since been
+wiped out in the most satisfactory way in the world!  Do you hear,
+Paddy?--_my wife_?--no, by God, because I choose to think of you like
+that now, I will not be content and I will not give in."
+
+His violence frightened her, and she shivered a little.  He saw it, and,
+with one of his swift changes, became suddenly penitent.
+
+"There--I didn't mean to frighten you.  You look quite bewildered, and
+so pale.  I am a brute.  Poor little woman.  Don't take any notice--
+don't remember anything except that I won't give in, because I know you
+are not as indifferent to me as you pretend, and also because you are
+lonely and forlorn."  His voice grew entrancingly gentle, "Patricia the
+Brave, Patricia the Independent, left out in the cold, and no one to
+realise that she feels it except the Mourne Lodge Bear.  Mavourneen--
+mavourneen--bears have understanding when they love as I love you."
+
+Big tears gathered in her eyes and splashed down unheeded on her hands.
+He leaned nearer, and a tremor passed through her.  When he spoke in
+that enthralling, wholly gentle cadence, it was as though her thoughts
+and faculties became numb.  It was as though solid ground were slipping
+away beneath her feet--branches breaking to which she was clinging for
+safety.  She could only clutch with a spasmodic grasp at the grim
+spectre of her old resolve.  She hid her face in her hands, staggered at
+the growing feebleness of her own resistance.
+
+"Paddy--dear little girl--my arms are still aching--_come_."
+
+She sprang up, white and trembling.
+
+"Oh, Lawrence, please stop--I am not quite myself to-day.  Let us go and
+look for the others."
+
+He hesitated a moment, then said:
+
+"They don't want us, and you look too tired to walk.  I expect you've
+been lying awake instead of going to sleep the last two or three nights,
+worrying about future plans.  Perhaps it isn't quite fair to press you
+any more now.  Anyhow, I've had more to-day than ever before, and I feel
+I can afford to wait.  If I don't say any more about the future, dear,
+will you just sit quietly there and rest until tea-time?  See, I'll give
+you two more days to get thoroughly readjusted to the new order of
+events, then I shall come to the Parsonage and claim you.  Will you
+agree to stay here quietly, Paddy, if I promise not to worry you?"
+
+She murmured an assent.
+
+"That's a sensible little woman.  I'll clean my gun--do you see?  I like
+doing it myself occasionally, and I've often thought how I'd love to do
+those sorts of things in here with you--I fiddling round with my hobbies
+and you sitting there--no need to say anything, but just to see your
+skirts, and your little feet, and your hair, and feel in every breath of
+me, not only that you are there, but that you _belong_ there."  He moved
+away.  "I suppose we're all family men at heart, directly we pass the
+frivolous stage and have wearied of banal excitements.  I never meant to
+be anything but a bachelor, but now I want a home and a fireside that is
+the real thing the same as all the rest of them.  I want
+you--_belonging_ there.
+
+"But I'm trespassing already.  If I don't mind you'll fly yet--you're
+such a wild little bird.  Don't take any notice; you can go to sleep if
+you like.  There's just half an hour before tea-time.  No one will know
+you are here; they are all too taken up with each other to think of
+anything else."
+
+Paddy closed her eyes gratefully, wondering why she felt so deathly
+tired.
+
+CHAPTER FORTY TWO.
+
+"WHAT WOULD AN IRISH FUSILIER DO?"
+
+They thought her a little strange at home that evening, but after a time
+Jack and Eileen vanished, and making a tremendous effort, she contrived
+to chatter to the aunties about her dispensing in a fairly brisk
+fashion.  She did not, however, altogether blind them, and she was glad
+enough when the need ceased, and she could go to bed.
+
+Eileen was sleeping with her mother, and Jack at the inn, so that she
+had his little room all to herself, and as soon as she was alone she
+flung herself down on the bed and burst into tears, overstrained nature
+finding no other mode of relief.
+
+When she had had her cry out, she lay quite still and tried to think--
+tried to understand how it was that the question she had meant to settle
+once for all in the afternoon was more unsettled than ever.  Why was it
+more unsettled?  There could not possibly be any temptation of giving
+in.  Giving in meant only one solution.  It meant that she, Patricia
+Adair, would marry Lawrence Blake.
+
+Oh! it was impossible--impossible!--the man she had over and over again
+asserted that she hated, and declared she would kill.
+
+Then why was there any difficulty?  Why this growing sense of a problem
+she could not solve?
+
+Supposing Patricia Adair did marry Lawrence Blake.  What of it?
+
+But she tore the thought out of her mind.  She would not suppose it.
+
+It came back in another form--a series of mental pictures cruelly
+contrasting Shepherd's Bush and the dispensary with Mourne Lodge.  For
+Paddy knew well enough that under no circumstances would she accept a
+home from Jack and her sister--under no circumstances give up her work
+and her independence, to be dependent on any one's bounty.  No, she
+would go back to her work alone, and they would live at The Ghan House
+without her.
+
+But how it hurt to think of it!
+
+The dingy suburb, the grey street, her aunt's everlasting platitudes,
+for of course she would live again at the doctor's house--just grey,
+lifeless monotony, instead of the lake and the mountains.
+
+And how he had understood!
+
+"_Mavourneen, mavourneen, bears have understanding when they love as I
+love you_."
+
+She tried to crush out the recollection, conscious that her soul was
+sounding indefinable warnings as a far-off accompaniment.  Oh, of
+course, he was fascinating--had she not always known it--known all her
+life that there were two Lawrence Blakes, and one as alluring as the
+other was repellant.  Resolutely, she turned her thoughts to the
+unpleasing one; she who had somehow had special opportunities of clear
+sight.  She remembered the old rumours of excess and extravagance.  Had
+not her own father shaken his head gravely long ago, and said things he
+imagined she would not understand.  Perhaps she did not then--but now!
+Unprincipled, unscrupulous, fast, wild, a gambler.  "Wild oats," she
+told herself--"Wild oats."  It was not that that built the barrier--this
+barrier that was as a grim spectre, waving ghostly arms between them.
+Could anything, even mercifully, write "wild oats" over his
+heartlessness?  When she thought of those locked hands in the boat on
+the loch, her blood still boiled--of how very nearly Eileen's delicate
+constitution had broken down altogether under her silent fretting--of
+how her mother had grieved and fretted likewise.  She thought of his
+moods at home.  How often--oh, how often--she had longed to strike him
+for the tone in which he sometimes spoke to his mother and sisters.  For
+his selfishness, his coldness, his sneers.  How often she had gone home
+pitying the girls such a brother, hating him with all her young
+enthusiasm.  And then, further complicating everything, flashed again
+the recollection, even in those days, of his charm, if he happened to be
+in the right mood.  Why, even Doreen and Kathleen were influenced by it;
+every one was.  If Lawrence were in his charming mood, the whole house
+was sunny and gay, and Paddy had quickly enough forgotten old feuds, and
+immensely enjoyed a good-natured, wordy battle with him.  When she hated
+him most, he had still had a lurking attraction for her, or she would
+not have bothered to cross swords.  Only a lurking attraction is not
+love.  The old spectre still stood firm, waving ghostly arms between
+them.  And even if it were love, the feud still stood.  Eileen might
+have forgiven and found other happiness.  She might have trampled down
+all bitterness, but did that make the wrong less wrong--did it affect
+her, Paddy's, view of the case?  A personal wrong may be forgiven by the
+sufferer without in any way affecting an outside judgment.  There is
+still the wrong in the abstract.  True, vengeance is unchristian--but it
+was not vengeance she wanted any longer; could she--dare she--fly in the
+face of her own passionate sense of Loyalty?  It seemed to Paddy that if
+she yielded to the wave that seemed like to sweep her off her feet, she
+not only let go her watchword of Loyalty, but she compromised with her
+half-formed, dimly seen ideal of Love.  Always before her mind, if she
+thought of love in the future, had been the image of such men as the
+grand old General--the gentle, kindly doctor--the simple, manly,
+open-hearted Jack.  Among such as these, how could she give such as
+Lawrence the place of honour?  It was incredible that she should think
+of it.  To do so, she must surely be disloyal to the past and disloyal
+to herself.  But how resist him?  Who could help her?  She got up at
+last and went to the window.  In the light of the stars, glimmering
+faintly across the garden, were the headstones--"where the dead people
+wait till God calls."
+
+Feeling suffocated by the four walls of the little room, she hastily
+threw a shawl round her head, slipped into a big coat, and crept
+noiselessly out of the house, down the little path, and through the
+wicket-gate into the churchyard, where a beautiful Maltese cross marked
+the spot where the brave old soldier was taking his well-earned rest.
+
+"Daddy," she whispered, "daddy, try and help me now.  There isn't any
+one else who would understand."
+
+She leaned her face against the cold granite.  It was comforting to be
+there.  "What shall I do, daddy?  I know you understand all about it,
+and how it is so difficult.  Daddy--darling old daddy--what would an
+Irish Fusilier do?"
+
+She clung against the cross yearningly, and in the night air, with the
+calm stars looking down, the waves whispering on the beach, and her
+beloved mountains all around, she grew calmer and stronger.  It pleased
+her to whisper her thoughts to the night, as if the unseen spirit of her
+beloved dead listened near.
+
+"Ought I to run away, daddy?  I remember how often you have said only a
+selfish, vain-glorious officer will risk his men against desperate odds,
+rather than retreat.  `Retreat, if wiser, and take up a better
+position--never mind the dispatches home--save your men and win the
+glory as well; it is sometimes nobler to retreat than to go on.'  Is
+that what I must do, daddy?  I feel there are desperate odds against me.
+Would it be braver to retreat?  Is that what an Irish Fusilier would
+do?  You, at least, will understand that I was not a coward."
+
+She pressed her lips against the granite for love of the grand and
+simple soul it stood to commemorate.
+
+"Daddy," she whispered, and there was a tiny, wistful smile on the
+fascinating mouth.  "I'm not an Irish Fusilier, but, perhaps, I'm
+the-next-best-thing."
+
+Then she went quietly back to bed, with her mind made up.
+
+But the next morning, it was only by a great physical and mental effort
+that she was able to appear at all like herself at the breakfast-table,
+and when the meal was finished she was glad to slip away unobserved.
+
+Eileen's suspicions, however, had been previously roused in the night by
+a light step in the passage, and, afterward, a dim figure crossing the
+garden.  She was tactful enough to say nothing of this, but at the same
+time determined to try and find out if anything was wrong, and how she
+could help.  In this Paddy had cause to be grateful, because her plans
+could scarcely he carried out without Eileen's help.
+
+When her sister sought her upstairs, and asked in a quiet, firm way,
+"What is the matter, Paddy?  Something has happened to you," she only
+hesitated a second, and then replied with as much calmness as she could
+muster:
+
+"Yes, Eily, I'm in rather a difficulty.  I was going to ask you and Jack
+to help me."
+
+"Paddy, we will do anything--anything," Eileen cried earnestly.
+
+"I know you will, but it isn't much I want--only that I am going back to
+London to-night, and I want you to help me manage it without any more
+questions and explanations than can possibly be helped."
+
+At first, Eileen was dumbfounded and greatly distressed, but Paddy was
+evidently desperately in earnest and meant to go.
+
+"Don't ask me anything, Eily, if you really want to help," she said
+wearily.  "Just break it to mother and the aunties a little while before
+I start and help to arrange some excuse for me to any others who ask
+questions."
+
+In the end it was all managed so, and Jack prepared to go to Greenore
+with her and see her safely on the boat for Holyhead, from whence she
+would go straight back to her uncle's.
+
+At the last moment Aunt Jane stole softly into her bedroom--Aunt Jane,
+whose heart had always leaned to Paddy, just as Aunt Mary's had leaned
+to Eileen.
+
+"My child," she said very tenderly, "I can see that you are in some
+great trouble, and I shall not know how to keep from fretting about you,
+because you have always been as my own child to me, and I would rather
+suffer myself than see you suffer.  Only we may not choose who shall be
+glad and who sad, and no doubt if we could, things would only be worse
+in the end.  But you won't forget your `old maid' auntie by the loch,
+darling, whose heart will ache silently, thinking of you day and night."
+
+The tears gushed from Paddy's eyes, and for a moment she seemed about to
+break down altogether, but in a few minutes she had managed to pull
+herself together again.
+
+"Are you sure you must go away alone like this?"  Aunt Jane asked
+yearningly.
+
+"Yes, auntie, quite sure.  I love you so much for coming to me now, but
+you mustn't make me break down.  Please help me to keep up, auntie, just
+until I get away."
+
+And Miss Jane did--having her own cry out later by herself--while the
+steamer started into the black, wintry night, and Jack stood watching it
+from Greenore pier, with a mist before his eyes and a queer huskiness in
+his throat.  Just when life was opening for him with all its sweetest
+and best, it seemed hard, indeed, that Paddy--his old chum and
+playmate--should be assailed with this trouble of which she would not
+speak, and in which apparently none of them could help her.  Jack cared
+just as much as his present happiness made it possible for him to care
+about anything.  Long ago, though he only remembered it with a smile,
+the sole problem of his life had been which of the sisters he loved the
+best.  Fate had tipped the balance to the elder's side, without in any
+measure depreciating the other; but Jack never knew, and never would
+know, what a difference that final choice had made to Paddy.
+
+CHAPTER FORTY THREE.
+
+A MAN'S PAIN.
+
+Lawrence received his first intimation of what had happened through
+Gwen; as Paddy had foreseen.
+
+He had been sitting most of the morning in his den, with the London
+newspapers, the lovers having all taken themselves off, with an air that
+forbade any one to follow on their peril, but he had not done much
+reading.  Small wonder, indeed!  Why read of stocks and shares, of wars
+and rumours of Wars, of the vagaries of Cabinet Ministers, and the
+sweet, childlike levity of Irish members--when the happiness for which
+your whole life seems to have been waiting is coming to you to-day?
+
+No, Lawrence did not read, he sat instead, gazing into the fire, making
+delightful plans for the future, in which Paddy was all in all.  The
+chair she had sat in was pulled up to the hearth, but he had not used it
+since; he felt it was her chair now, and his fancy loved to see her
+sitting there still, with her two little hands clasping the two arms,
+and her head leaning back with that slight air of weariness which
+somehow made her only the more enchanting.
+
+He was strangely happy that one morning, there had never been anything
+in all his life before in the least like it.  In the afternoon he meant
+to go and look for her by the loch; he believed she would be waiting for
+him--and if not, well he would go to the Parsonage and claim her.
+
+He went over the interview in his fancy, detail by detail, as it might
+be, as he would like it to be.
+
+Paddy would be shy, that was a delicious thought to him.  He had known
+too many of the women who meet a man half-way without the slightest
+qualm, and practically thrust his first kiss upon him, thinking of it
+only as one of many to follow.  How different it would be with Paddy!
+He even wondered, with a little inward smile, whether she would let him
+kiss her at all this first interview, or at any rate before they were
+just parting.  He did not mean to press her or hurry her in any way.
+Once having her promise, he could afford to wait.
+
+Still it was deliriously sweet to think of, and he sat forward with his
+arms across his knees picturing the sacred moment.  He thought how he
+would coax her, and how she would yield gradually, and then he would
+fold her in his arms and hold her tight against his heart while their
+lips met.
+
+He was roused by a step coming along the passage to his door, a hurried
+step, that had a suggestion of being agitated in some way.  Then the
+door opened, and Gwen put her head in to see if he was there.  Finding
+he was, she came in and shut the door quietly behind her, and something
+in the quiet of her usually radiant face was ominous.
+
+"What has happened between you and Paddy, Lawrence?" she asked, coming
+close up to him.  "I thought everything was all right; that it was
+practically settled."  He clenched his hands suddenly.
+
+"It is.  Why?"
+
+Gwen looked at him, and a wave of painful feeling passed over her face.
+
+"She has run away," she said; "she went back to London alone last
+night."
+
+Instantly, as in a flash, he understood.  He did not speak, he did not
+utter a sound, but sat there in a silence that became terrible, his
+hands clenched and his mouth rigid.  Gwen gave a little shiver.
+
+At last to break the awful tension she continued:
+
+"We called to see her this morning--Bob and I, and they told us she had
+crossed last night.  They told us some sort of a tale about her uncle
+wanting her, but of course I didn't believe it.  I just pretended to,
+and then came back here feeling as if I'd had a shock."
+
+Still he did not speak nor move, only staring with that fixed gaze into
+vacancy.  If there was any difference at all, he was grinding his teeth
+together, to hold in check some inner tumult, rising momentarily higher.
+
+Gwen grew a little frightened.  She had never seen him like this, never
+seen any man, in the first deadly throes of an anguish that was as life
+and death to him.
+
+"What are you going to do, Lawrie?" she said.  "Perhaps, she has not
+really run away from you."
+
+Still no word or sign.
+
+She put her hand on his shoulder to rouse him.
+
+"What are you going to do, Lawrie?" she asked again.
+
+"Go to the devil!" in a low, bitter voice of unmistakable meaning, and
+without raising his eyes.
+
+She slipped down on her knees beside him and clasped her hands round his
+arm.
+
+"Don't, Lawrie--don't," she prayed, all her long affection for him
+crystallising, and grasping just all that his bitter words might mean.
+"I can't bear you to take it like this.  Oh! it is terrible, and just
+when I am so happy.  I will go to Paddy, she will listen to me--I will
+make her see things differently.  Lawrie, don't look like that--she
+shall be yours, I promise you she shall.  You shall have your
+happiness."
+
+But he only shook her off roughly.
+
+"Leave me alone.  You! you have got your happiness, what do you know
+about mine?"
+
+It was the first time in her life that he had spoken roughly to her, and
+Gwen shrank back almost as if she had been struck.
+
+"You can't--you can't--mean to speak to me like that, Lawrie--"
+
+"I think you had better go away," was all he said.  "I might do you an
+injury."
+
+For a moment she was transfixed, then she rose to her feet, and turned
+slowly to the door.  Here she paused a moment.
+
+"I will tell them you are not well, and do not want any lunch," she
+said.  "Later on I will come back."
+
+After lunch Mrs Blake rose quickly from the table, and went toward the
+door.  Gwen was immediately in a fever of anxiety.  What should she do?
+In desperation she put a detaining hand upon the mother's arm:
+
+"You--you--are not going to Lawrence?" she stammered.
+
+"My dear," answered Mrs Blake, "didn't you say he was not well?"
+
+"I know--I know--but--indeed, it would be better to leave him alone for
+a little."  Mrs Blake regarded her with surprise.  "I don't understand
+you," she said a little haughtily.  "I only wish to see if I can do
+anything for him."
+
+"He said he did not want to be disturbed," murmured poor Gwen
+distractedly.
+
+"My dear, I am his mother," and Mrs Blake passed out of the room.
+
+Gwen stood a moment watching her cross the hall with a fascinated gaze,
+and then suddenly darted across to the drawing-room, and burying her
+face in a sofa-cushion burst into tears, to the unutterable
+consternation of her faithful giant, who followed immediately, and had
+much ado to soothe her.  They were startled presently by the sound of a
+door being violently slammed, as only a man could slam it, and then
+halting footsteps approached the hall.  Gwen went to the door, but drew
+back horror-struck.  Mrs Blake was going toward the stairs, and her
+face was the colour of a corpse.  She looked as if she were dazed and
+petrified.  Then Kathleen, who had been waiting nervously in the
+dining-room, crossed quickly to her with open arms, and a little cry of,
+"Mother!  Mother! what is it?--are you ill?"
+
+Her mother looked at her as if she could hardly understand, and then
+dropped senseless.  A second later Bob Russell carried her upstairs, and
+laid her on her bed.  Gwen stayed with Kathleen until she had come
+round, and then slipped away to the drawing-room again, feeling utterly
+unstrung.  Doreen and her _fiance_ were fortunately out to lunch.
+
+"It was Lawrence," she said, in reply to Bob's anxious questions; "he
+must have been terrible, and to her, his own mother!  Oh, it is awful,
+Bob," and the tears streamed down her face again.  Bob sprang to his
+feet.
+
+"Shall I go and throttle him!--the worm!  A man who can behave like that
+to his mother, isn't fit to live.  I'll go and tell him so--I'll--
+I'll--"
+
+"Oh, no, no, no," cried Gwen, "you don't understand.  It is dreadful of
+him, but he is mad about something.  I knew it, and I tried to stop
+her."
+
+The giant went on muttering imprecations, however, and Owen had hard
+work to hold him when presently that distant door slammed again.  She
+crossed to the window quickly, and was just in time to see Lawrence
+stride down the drive, with that terrible fixed look still on his face.
+
+No one sat down to dinner that night, except Kathleen, and Gwen, and Bob
+Russell.  Mrs Blake was too ill, and Lawrence did not come back.
+Doreen and her barrister were still away.
+
+Kathleen was in a state of pent-up fury, which now and then burst its
+bounds in passionate indictment against her brother.  "Why can't he stay
+away," she said, "if he can't behave like a gentleman?  I'm sure we
+don't want him here, he is always a wet blanket, and upsets mother about
+something or other every day.  It has been the same ever since he went
+to college.  He doesn't care for anything in heaven or earth except
+himself; I'm sick of it.  If he doesn't go away and stay away, I'll just
+take mother to live somewhere else altogether."
+
+Gwen was much too fond of Lawrence and much too staunch to her friends
+not to speak a word for him in spite of her own inward anger.
+
+"There is a reason for it, Kit," she said.  "Don't judge him to-day.
+He'll be all right again presently."
+
+"Until the next time," with an angry sneer, very like her brother's.  "I
+tell you it isn't good enough, Owen.  He's not going to behave like this
+to mother again, I'll get between them if he kills me for it.  What has
+he ever been to her but a curse?--drinking, and gambling, and idling
+about the world.  Oh, I dare say he's charming enough to you always! we
+all know there isn't a man could be more fascinating when he likes, but
+how much does that go for beside scenes like this?"
+
+Gwen set her teeth.
+
+"You are not fair," she said.  "Lawrence has behaved like a brute
+to-day, and I dare say it isn't the first time, but he has neither
+gambled nor drunk for years, and there have been times when he was
+goodness itself to his mother."
+
+"And few and far enough between too," sneered Kathleen.  "I'm only
+thankful that he hasn't got engaged to any friend of mine; for if I
+cared for her very much, I'd sooner see her in her grave than married to
+Lawrence."
+
+"Nonsense!" exclaimed Gwen sharply, and then stopped short, suddenly
+remembering she was a guest, and the dinner finished in a constrained
+silence.
+
+"Bob and I will go on to Dublin to-morrow," she told Kathleen later,
+"and don't bother about us this evening.  We will look after each other,
+and you stay with Mrs Blake."
+
+When Doreen and her _fiance_ returned, she made up some sort of a tale
+to them, and then persuaded every one to go to bed early, that Lawrence,
+if he returned, might come in and go to his room unnoticed.
+
+She did not go to bed herself, however, but sat up with her door open,
+waiting for him.  At two o'clock in the morning she heard his latchkey
+in the front door, and went down bravely to meet him.
+
+When Lawrence saw her he glared at her angrily, but she took no notice,
+though inwardly shocked at the unspeakable change on his face since the
+morning.  He was deathly white, with an almost tigerish expression, and
+she knew he had been drinking.
+
+"I couldn't rest until I knew you had come in," she said, trying to
+speak naturally.
+
+"What did you suppose I should do?" with a bitter sneer.  "Go and drown
+myself, or cross to England with a pistol!  No, thank you!  I'm not that
+sort.  I shall not oblige any _Police News_ with a paragraph."
+
+"What are you going to do, Lawrie?" unheeding him.  "Bob and I are going
+on to Dublin to-morrow--you come too--"
+
+He strode into the dining-room without answering--and she followed him.
+On the sideboard stood the spirit decanters as usual, and she saw his
+eye instantly turn to them, and a second later he had his hand upon the
+whisky.
+
+Quickly she was at his side:
+
+"Don't have any more, Lawrie," pleadingly.  "You have had quite enough,"
+and she placed her hand over his.  For one moment he glared at her
+again, then let go, and sinking into a chair by the table, buried his
+face in his hands.
+
+"Have you been playing billiards?" she asked, resting her hand on his
+shoulder.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"For high sums, I suppose?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"I hope there isn't misery in some other house in Newry to-night,
+through you."
+
+"On the contrary, some of them must feel quite rich."
+
+"Then you lost?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"I'm very glad."
+
+"Thank you," dryly.
+
+Gwen stood looking at him, noting vaguely the lines that had deepened in
+his face, and wondering what to do.
+
+"Lawrie."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Your mother is ill.  She fainted, and Bob carried her upstairs."
+
+He winced, but his face did not soften.
+
+"You must have behaved like a blackguard to her," and there was a tremor
+of intense feeling in Gwen's voice.
+
+"It's quite likely.  But I warned her--why did she come in?  I told her
+not to, and she has known me long enough."
+
+"I wonder what Paddy would think of it?"
+
+He ground his teeth.
+
+"What does it matter?--what does anything matter?  I used not to care,
+and I will be the same again.  I have been a fool to let myself get set
+upon anything--" He got up, and pushed his chair aside roughly.  "I am
+going away to-morrow!  I don't know where, except that I shall go to
+London first--afterward, to the devil, as I said before."
+
+He turned to the door, and she could not but follow.
+
+"You needn't worry any more to-night.  I won't touch the whisky again,
+and I won't shoot myself," and without waiting for her, he strode off up
+the stairs.
+
+CHAPTER FORTY FOUR.
+
+"I CANNOT COME."
+
+For a whole week Lawrence knocked about London, and it was just as well
+for their peace of mind that none of those who cared for him saw him.
+
+One Sunday afternoon he suddenly called a taxi and drove off to
+Shepherd's Bush.
+
+On asking for Miss Adair he was ushered in and led to the dingy,
+old-fashioned drawing-room.  It was some time before a step approached,
+and then the doctor, with a keen look in his kindly eyes, entered alone.
+
+Lawrence was watching the door with a fixed intentness that scarcely
+gave when the unexpected comer entered.
+
+"My niece has a very bad headache," the doctor said simply, as he shook
+hands.  "She does not feel equal to seeing any one to-day.  I am sorry
+you should have had this long drive for nothing."
+
+"Is she ill?"  Lawrence asked bluntly.
+
+"Oh, no, only ailing a little.  The weather has been very trying the
+last week."
+
+The doctor studied the visitor carefully.  Paddy's hurried return had
+caused him much food for anxious thought, coupled with her evident low
+spirits and loss of appetite.  He shot a bow at a venture.
+
+"I think you come from Omeath?" he said.
+
+Lawrence assented, but seemed lost in thought.
+
+"Wouldn't she see me just for a few minutes?" he asked.  "I don't want
+to worry her, but I have come from Omeath, and she might like to hear
+about them all at home."
+
+The doctor went away, but came back again alone.
+
+"She is not well enough to-day," he repeated.  "She thanks you for
+calling and is sorry she cannot see you."
+
+And Lawrence was obliged to call a cab again and drive away.  As he went
+down the steps he met a slim youth who regarded him somewhat fixedly,
+but Lawrence never even saw him.  He would have been a little amused,
+perhaps, had he known that the same youth shook his fist threateningly
+after him from behind the safe shelter of the doctor's front door.
+
+"If you're the cuss who's worrying Paddy's life out of her," he mentally
+apostrophised Lawrence's back, "I'd uncommonly like to have you in the
+dissecting-room," which blood-curdling threat Basil was fortunately
+quite unable to carry out.
+
+Lawrence went back to his club and wrote a letter to Paddy.
+
+It was a beautiful letter.  Nature had, of a truth, been erratic with
+this one of her children, for it seemed impossible that the writer of
+this letter and the man who could speak to his mother in a way that made
+her really ill for days could be one and the same.
+
+It distressed Paddy beyond words.  In spite of everything she might say,
+his suffering tore her heart.  Yet her will held firm, and she would not
+tell him to come.  She wrote him a little letter, however, in which he
+perceived that she no longer pretended to be repulsed by him, and that
+absence might be serving him better than a meeting just then.  He held
+the letter long in his hand, and was conscious of a sudden swift regret.
+"If there were more girls like her," was his thought, "how much better
+it would be for us men and for all the world.  If I had only loved her
+sooner, or some one like her, I should have been a different man
+to-day."
+
+Ah, that eternal "if--if."  And meanwhile all things march on the same.
+The girls will not see, so the men do not heed, and there is folly and
+wrong and weakness where there might be strength and rich content.
+Where there is a great man there was a great woman before; and so it
+would seem Nature is always trying to point out to us that, though the
+Men have the strength, the Women have the power, and where they are
+strong and true all things are possible--for the fireside, the
+household, the sphere of influence at hand, the greatness of the nation
+itself.  Be smart, be comely, be gay--why not?--only ring true also, and
+the men who admire you for your comeliness, will worship you for your
+goodness.
+
+Lawrence kept his letter and read it often, but he did not go away.  He
+liked feeling that he was there in the same city, breathing the same
+air, although she remained inexorable about seeing him.  Often, in fits
+of despair, he thought he would go away, but always in the end he
+decided to remain.
+
+He bought a racing motor, and seemed to find some relief in flying madly
+over the county at a terrible pace.  Three times he was had up for
+furious driving, and the third time his fine was the heaviest ever
+exacted for a like cause, and he received a strong reprimand as well and
+a threat that a fourth offence would be even more strenuously dealt
+with.
+
+He left the court laughing, and his friends began to wonder anxiously
+where his recklessness would end.
+
+Gwen returned to town about the time of the third offence, and
+remonstrated forcibly with him, but made no visible effect.
+
+"Have you seen Paddy again?" she asked him.
+
+"She will not see me."
+
+Gwen knit her forehead in perplexity.
+
+"I have written, and she has not answered," she said.  "I don't know
+what to make of her.  I must go and see her."
+
+"Not yet," he said, and she looked up in surprise.  His face, however,
+expressed nothing.
+
+"I wrote to her, and she answered it," he continued, "and I do not want
+her to be worried about me for the present.  Stay away for a little
+while, Gwen.  I think she would rather you did."
+
+So Gwen possessed her soul in patience for three weeks, to please
+Lawrence, and then went upon an unexpected errand.
+
+Paddy was roaming about restlessly that dreary winter afternoon at the
+beginning of February when Gwen came.  She had been out in the morning,
+and she kept trying to make up her mind to go out again for something to
+do, but instead she continued to roam about with that odd feeling of
+unrest, quite unable to settle down to anything.
+
+Eileen and her mother had come back to London again now, but only until
+the spring quarter, when, the lease of their house was up, and they
+hoped to have done with London for good.
+
+The wedding was to take place in April, there was nothing to wait for,
+and several hearts eager enough to see it happily become a fact.
+
+The Ghan House was being renovated throughout, and Eileen was busy with
+her trousseau--no time to spare between January and April.
+
+Paddy helped a great deal.  She did not like plain sewing--indeed, she
+very much disliked it, always contriving to prick herself badly and
+leave little danger signals, so to speak, where she had stitched.  She
+might have been said to be preparing Eileen's trousseau with her heart's
+blood, only not with the meaning this phrase, beloved of serial writers,
+is generally intended to convey.
+
+She had her own views as to quantities, which, however, as they did not
+at all fit in with her mother's and Eileen's, she wisely kept to
+herself.  No use warring against the majority, and little matter either
+way.  If the others thought dozens of everything necessary Paddy
+supposed it was all right, but, for her part, she wondered how so many
+clothes could possibly ever get worn, and where Eileen was going to keep
+them all when she was not wearing them.
+
+"We might be making clothes for Jack as well," she remarked once,
+surveying the growing piles; and when they told her laughingly Jack was
+getting his own dozens and half-dozens, she fairly gasped.
+
+Nothing much had been said about that speedy flight of hers at
+Christmas.  Both Eileen and the mother had attempted to win her
+confidence, but Paddy would not speak.  Eileen had finally guessed.
+
+"It is Lawrence, Paddy, isn't it?" she asked.
+
+Paddy, driven in a corner, consented, but would not go on.
+
+Eileen had then fidgeted a little, and, blushing painfully, stammered:
+
+"You would not let anything in reference to me two years ago influence
+you, I hope, Paddy."
+
+Paddy made no reply.
+
+"Because, as it happened, you see, it was such a good thing.  I could
+never have been as happy with any one else as I am with Jack.  Tell me,
+Paddy?" looking hard into her sister's eyes.
+
+Paddy shook her head.
+
+"I can't tell you anything, Eily," she answered.  "Please don't ask me."
+And Eileen had to give in.
+
+Jack tried when he came for a flying visit about wall-papers and paint
+and things, and it was then for the first time that they learnt of
+Paddy's unlooked-for decision.
+
+"What colour is your room to be, Paddy?" he asked.  "I am waiting your
+orders."
+
+"You are very good," a little uncomfortably, "but I'm not coming to live
+at The Ghan House."
+
+"Not coming to live at The Ghan House!" as if he could not believe his
+own ears, while Eileen and her mother looked up in amazement.
+
+Paddy had to brace herself with the utmost determination.
+
+"I have thought it all over carefully," she said, "and I have decided to
+stay in London.  I have developed a very independent spirit of late,
+somehow," with a little smile, "and I mean to stick to my post."
+
+"But, my dear child--" began Mrs Adair in great distress, while Jack
+threw a newspaper at her head and said:
+
+"Don't talk rubbish, Paddy."
+
+Eileen looked dumbfounded.
+
+"It is not rubbish," Paddy went on bravely, "and nothing you can say
+will alter me.  I have spoken to uncle about it, and he is going to let
+me live with them and pay something."  She paused a moment, drawing a
+pattern on the tablecloth.  "He does not want me to pay," she went on,
+"he says he will be only too glad to have me, but I would like to feel
+perfectly independent.  He is lonely sometimes, and he always wanted a
+daughter."
+
+A mistiness crossed her eyes, and she smiled a little crooked smile as
+she added:
+
+"Daddy always wanted a son, and I did my best.  He is daddy's brother,
+and he wants a daughter--I am going to do my best again.  I never seem
+to quite `get there,' do If--I am evidently destined only to shine as a
+substitute--to be only the-next-best-thing."
+
+"But, Paddy," coming behind her and leaning over the table with his arm
+across her shoulders, "you hate London so," coaxed Jack.  "How are
+Eileen and I to be perfectly happy, thinking of you pining for fresh air
+here?"
+
+"You must not think--it would only be silly--you will have each other
+and,"--there was a little catch in her voice--"mother."
+
+Mrs Adair looked up quickly; hitherto she had not spoken.
+
+"No, Paddy," she said, "I shall stay with you.  I do not mind London at
+all now I have got used to it, and I could not leave you behind alone.
+I should not be happy at Omeath without you."
+
+But Paddy would not hear of it, and after a long discussion it was
+finally decided that she should remain with her uncle for six months.
+Having gained her point, she quickly drew their attention back to the
+wall-papers, which were eagerly discussed in their turn, amid the usual
+amount of nonsense and twitting on her part and Jack's.
+
+The next day she told her uncle that she had won her point, and was
+coming to them, at any rate for the present.  Something like tears
+instantly dimmed the kindly doctor's eyes; he had grown more than fond
+of his young dispenser and niece.
+
+"It will be as good as having a daughter," he said, a little huskily.
+
+Paddy laughed.  "It is my particular _forte_," she said, "to be
+the-next-best-thing."
+
+Her aunt was no less pleased.
+
+"Really, my dear," she remarked, folding her hands contentedly upon her
+ample front, "I shall be very pleased to have you.  I don't like girls,
+as a rule--they're all so flighty and flirty, and fond of gew-gaws and
+things, but you are somehow different.  You are not as interested in the
+church guilds and parish meetings as I could wish, and you are a little
+wanting in respect to poor Mr Dickinson," naming the meek young curate;
+"but you are young yet, and by and by you will see how empty and shallow
+and vain are all amusements compared with church work and the beautiful
+church services."
+
+Paddy had her doubts, but she kept them to herself, and just then Basil
+came in to give his opinion.
+
+"The guv'nor says you're going to stay here after March," he exclaimed.
+"How beastly, jolly, thundering nice!"
+
+"My dear boy!" gasped his mother, horror-struck; "what an extraordinary
+way of expressing yourself."
+
+"Says what I mean pretty straight, anyhow.  I guess I'll have a key of
+the dispensary and only allow Paddy in at her proper hours.  If we don't
+mind she'll go messing about with those silly old medicines half the
+day."
+
+So it was all arranged, and Paddy was somewhat relieved, but her heart
+was unusually heavy on that February afternoon, with the weight of a
+longing that, in its steady insistence, was beginning to undermine those
+strong defences of hers, built up by that spirit of fanaticism so
+strangely blended with her open, generous nature.
+
+It had been there for some time now, this creeping, growing longing, but
+until the Christmas holiday it had been given such short shrift, it
+scarcely dared to hold up its head.  Whenever it did, seizing advantage
+of some soft moment, it was almost immediately stamped on by the
+warrior-like, fanatical Paddy, nursing her sense of injury, and
+armour-plating herself against a softness her heart clamoured more and
+more strongly to yield to.
+
+But during the Christmas holiday the longing had developed an ache,
+which gave it a new power.  The ache of an incredible loneliness, which
+seemed to come down suddenly out of nowhere.  And always when the ache
+was strongest, it seemed to sound insistently in her ears and in her
+soul just one sentence: "Mavourneen, mavourneen, bears have
+understanding when they love as I love you..."
+
+And with the sentence came other thoughts.  Thoughts that thrilled and
+frightened her both at once, setting her heart beating to a strange new
+measure.  It was a measure she had experienced for the first time that
+afternoon in his den, when all the others were paired off, and they two
+left alone together.  When, sitting quietly at his fireside, she had
+felt as if her little world were entirely changed, and she left in a
+position that required much readjusting all round.  And it was so
+difficult to readjust herself.  With Eileen and Jack married and living
+at The Ghan House, and her mother with them, what was to be her place in
+the general scheme?  Was there, indeed, nothing for her but that
+independent spirit, and the dispensary, and this fighting against an
+ache that threatened to overpower her heart?  And then would come the
+thought, suppose she gave up fighting?... suppose... suppose...  But
+there Paddy usually stopped short--a strange new world she was shyly
+afraid of lay beyond that word, and the fanatical spirit was promptly
+re-enforced.  Of course she could not give up fighting.  It was
+monstrous to think it; and for a little while the old flash would be in
+her eyes, and the old resolute set of the lips.
+
+And then, at the first "letting go," back would come the same engrossing
+memory: "Mavourneen, mavourneen, bears have understanding when they love
+as I love you."
+
+Ah, what understanding he had, what wild allurement!
+
+Fancy played with her then, laughing at the fanatic, snapping light
+fingers at the warrior-spirit.  "Supposing you were to let yourself go,"
+said Fancy, "and to swim out into the comforting warmth of that
+understanding, shutting away the loneliness with it, and letting all the
+readjusting solve itself into just sitting by a fireside that was all
+your own for ever...!"
+
+How the ache and the longing grew when Fancy triumphed, how alluringly
+the voice sounded.
+
+So it came to a day when Paddy the Fearless asked herself a question,
+and left it unanswered because she was afraid.  But though she spoke no
+reply, perhaps it was given just as poignantly in a bright head buried
+in a pillow, and a little reluctant whisper, breathed to the feathers:
+"Oh, Lawrence, I can't help it.  I want you.  I want you."
+
+And the next afternoon, that sombre February day, she stood in the
+window still remembering, still vainly wrestling and puzzling, when a
+taxi drew up at the door, and Gwen stepped out.
+
+"Wait," she said to the driver and ran up the steps with a haste that
+was somewhat startling.
+
+Paddy went out into the hall and opened the door herself, and
+immediately Gwen exclaimed: "Oh, I'm so glad you're in, Paddy.  Lawrence
+has been hurt in a motor smash.  He wants to see you badly, and I said I
+would take you.  Be quick, won't you?  I don't like leaving him.  He is
+in great pain, and one never knows..."
+
+CHAPTER FORTY FIVE.
+
+THE INVALID.
+
+Paddy hesitated a moment, looking straight into Gwen's eyes, almost with
+a challenge.
+
+"How much is he hurt?"
+
+"I don't know.  It happened three days ago, and he was taken to a
+hospital, but father had him brought in an ambulance to our house
+to-day.  Surely you are not going to refuse to come...!"
+
+"No," said Paddy slowly, "I am coming;" but her instinct told her he
+would not have been moved if he had been very badly hurt, and she
+believed that Gwen knew it.  Still, when she saw him, her heart smote
+her indefinably; for Lawrence lying on a sofa with his arm in a splint,
+and a white, exhausted air of endurance, was something she could not
+steel herself against.  She wished vaguely that Gwen had not left them
+alone so quickly, and moved away a little further, uncertain of herself.
+
+"I'm not much hurt," he told her carelessly, though even as he spoke she
+saw that a spasm of sharp pain made him clench his hands and teeth.
+"But I expect I'm in for a bad time with my arm, and may have to have it
+off in the end.  Serves me right, I suppose."  Then he added: "I don't
+want the mater to know anything about it yet.  She would only worry
+herself ill.  How are you?  It was nice of you to come."  He was looking
+at her as if he could read her soul, and Paddy felt her colour rising,
+and was unable to meet his eyes.  She longed suddenly to go to him in
+his pain-wrung helplessness and touch his bandaged arm, and the fear
+that she would show it held her silent and constrained and aloof.  With
+his quick intuition Lawrence noted everything.
+
+"Why, I believe you're quite sorry about this stupid smash!" with a
+little callous laugh; "sorry in spite of yourself, eh, Paddy?"  She did
+not answer, feeling vaguely hurt, and he ran on: "You're allowed to pity
+me, then, and to come and see me out of charity as the poor invalid!
+Well, I don't know that there's anything in the world I hate more than
+charity, but I seem to be with the beggars every time now, and called
+upon to be thankful for anything I can get."
+
+"You know it is not charity," she blurted out.  "It is unkind of you to
+say so.  I hate to see you lying there, looking so ill.  I--I--" She
+stopped short suddenly--pitfalls lay ahead that might engulf her.
+
+"Let it be charity if it brings you nearer.  I can't afford pride any
+longer.  Charity should bring you close beside my couch of suffering,
+laying your hand on my fevered brow, and all that stuff.  You are not a
+very good district visitor, Paddy."  There was a taunt in his voice, and
+he saw that he was hurting her more and more, and because in some way it
+gave him pleasure, he drove the barbs in.  "Don't look so resentful.  Do
+you feel you've been trapped here under false pretences?  Did Gwen tell
+you I was dying or something?  How wicked of her!  And now you find I've
+only a smashed-up arm, and all that beautiful Christian spirit of pity
+is like to be wasted on an unworthy object.  Well, the arm hurts pretty
+badly, if that is any help to you.  They give me morphia now and then,
+but I wouldn't have it to-day."
+
+But that was a little too much, and a flash of the old Paddy came back.
+"You have no right to speak to me like this," she declared hotly; "it is
+ungenerous of you.  I have done nothing to deserve it.  Gwen told me
+that you were hurt, and that you wanted me; that was all."
+
+"And haven't I wanted you for weeks and months!...  Yet you only ran
+away.  Paddy, why did you run away from Omeath!  It wasn't quite fair.
+You made me behave like a brute; and to mother.  I'm expiating it in my
+mind every hour, but, thank heaven, a mother like mine always
+understands.  I wrote afterward and told her how it happened.  I'd have
+gone across if I hadn't had this smash."  His voice changed suddenly, as
+with a quick, keen expression he leaned toward her and asked: "Paddy,
+why did you run away?...  Why do you treat me like this, _when you love
+me_?"
+
+Again the tell-tale colour flooded her face, and she could not meet his
+eyes; but pulling herself together quickly, she answered in a voice that
+had borrowed some of the taunt from his: "I thought you said it was just
+charity."
+
+He smiled as if the taunt pleased him.  "It is certainly about the same
+temperature just now.  But there, I won't tease you any more.  You were
+a dear thing to come.  I'll get you a cozy, inviting chair if I can,
+then perhaps you'll stay."  He attempted to rise, but the effort brought
+on a sharp spasm that turned him faint, and Paddy sprang forward.
+
+"Oh, you mustn't move, you mustn't move," she cried.  "Why did you try
+to?...  Can I get you anything...!"
+
+His rigid lips broke into the ghost of a smile, and a great tenderness
+came into his eyes.  "Sit where I can see you, mavourneen; it is all the
+healing I need."
+
+Paddy pulled up a footstool, and sat beside him, and quietly began to
+run her fingers with a light touch up and down his uninjured arm.  She
+had seen his mother do it, and knew he found it soothing.  Thus for some
+time neither spoke, and gradually the drawn, blue look left his face.
+At last, from gazing into the fire, she looked up suddenly into his
+face, and found he was watching her intently.
+
+"Mavourneen," he said very quietly, "I suspected that you were beginning
+to care at Christmas.  I know it now.  What are you going to do about
+it?"
+
+She hid her face against his hand, and did not reply.
+
+"What is your own idea, anyway?" he asked, in a winsome, humorous voice.
+
+"Oh, if you could only run away with me by force," she murmured
+intensely.  "If only I needn't decide at all.  I'm just a lump of
+obstinacy, and I don't want to climb down and meekly give in; don't you
+see how I hate that part of it?  You could always say `I told you so,'"
+and she smiled a little.
+
+"Bravo, Patricia!  I like that spirit in you.  Curse it all, a few
+hundred years ago, I'd just have brought along my men-at-arms and
+captured you.  What good old days they must have been.  And here we are
+hemmed in all round by barriers, and I haven't even got a couple of good
+arms to drag you onto my horse.  But anyhow, the gods are evidently
+relenting, so I'll take heart and think out a plan."  He saw her glance
+at the clock.
+
+"Must you go now?  Are the beastly medicine bottles squirming on the
+shelf?  Well, I won't keep you.  It isn't good enough with a crocked-up
+arm.  In fact, it isn't good at all; it's merely maddening.  You see, I
+want to kiss you, Paddy, and I dare say if I asked very appealingly and
+pathetically, you would lean over and give me a sort of benevolent,
+motherly salute."  He gave a low laugh with a note of masterfulness in
+it.  "But I'll have none of it.  To dream as I have dreamed, and then
+begin with a mild caress!  _Never_.  I forbid you to come near me again
+until I'm on my feet with, at any rate, one strong arm.  Then I'll show
+you.  I had always a weakness for the best."
+
+She stood up, a little non-plussed and uncertain, but he only smiled
+into her eyes with something of the old mocking light.
+
+"Good-by, mavourneen, I'll let you know when you must come again.  I've
+had enough healing for a little--and I'm sure the bottles are
+clamouring."
+
+"Good-by," she answered, and went slowly out of the room.
+
+But as she trundled back to Shepherd's Bush on a motor 'bus, she saw no
+greyness and shabbiness and desolation any more--saw nothing at all--
+only knew that in her heart there was a sort of shy, fierce, bewildering
+gladness.
+
+CHAPTER FORTY SIX.
+
+THE SOLUTION.
+
+A week passed, and no message of any sort reached Paddy, so that,
+finally, in desperation she rang up Gwen on the telephone to ask for
+news.  Gwen's voice sounded a little cold and constrained, and Paddy
+learned nothing beyond the fact that Lawrence was progressing very well.
+Gwen said that she would tell him Paddy had inquired, but he was
+sleeping now.
+
+Paddy hung up the receiver, feeling as if a weight had come down upon
+her.  What did it mean?  Evidently he had no message for her, and Gwen
+no longer dreamt of coming to fetch her.  She went out for a walk, and
+found herself in a 'bus going toward Gwen's home.  She walked down
+Grosvenor Place, and saw Gwen come out, looking very gay and lovely with
+her giant, and the two of them sped away together in a motor.  So
+Lawrence was alone.  Yet she could not go to him.  The situation seemed
+impossible, almost absurd.  Surely he had not suddenly ceased to want
+her!  Yet not for the world would she cross the road and present herself
+unasked.  So there was nothing for it but to go back to the bottles and
+prescriptions, and to the making of that endless trousseau for Eileen.
+They--Eileen and her mother--had heard about Lawrence's accident at
+last, and told her of it as a piece of news.  It seemed Mrs Blake had
+come over, and was established at Gwen's home with him.  So, of course,
+he did not particularly want her now.  When the pain was bad, his mother
+would soothe him with that running touch; and when he felt better, Gwen
+was there to make him laugh.  She told herself she did not mind.  That
+fortunately she had known him too well to let herself go in any real
+sense.  He was just fickle as ever, that was all.
+
+Nevertheless, a yet duller ache began to be her portion.  An ache that
+was akin to sheer misery.  The future began to frighten her a little.
+Was it possible the making up of medicines was to be her portion
+indefinitely?  Perhaps for many more of the glad, joyous, youthful years
+now speeding by.  One day a letter came from Ted Masterman, and when
+Paddy had read it, she stood long and silently gazing at the blank,
+uninteresting windows opposite.  He was prospering now, and seemed full
+of content with his surroundings.  Too full of content.  In her present
+mood Paddy resented it.  She resented it a little because she knew he
+possessed those traits which make for happiness which Lawrence lacked.
+If there had been no Lawrence, she might have grown to care for Ted.  As
+it was, she could not care for either.  At least, so she told herself,
+waiting day after day for the message which did not come.  Sometimes she
+told herself she had disappointed him in some way, and he had decided to
+withdraw while he could.  Another time, she remembered what he had said
+about the kiss, and her cheeks burned, and her eyes fell.  Was it
+possible he was really waiting until he could stand with ease, and was
+himself again!  And if so...
+
+She wondered a little whether she would have the courage to go,
+supposing the message came in the end.  Something in her seemed to have
+lost confidence.  She was the same--yet different.  She wanted again to
+run away, only now she also wanted still more to stay.  She read Ted
+Masterman's letter again, and told herself he was a man to make any
+woman happy, and that if she said the word, he would come back at once,
+whereas Lawrence...
+
+The uncertainty made her moody and restless, and her mother and Eileen
+looked at her a little perplexedly.  Eileen asked her about the letter
+from Ted, but she only said he was prosperous and happy.  "Is he coming
+home?"  Eileen suggested, and she answered: "Not that I know of," in a
+way that had a final ring.  Mrs Blake called one day, and told them
+Lawrence had made a remarkable recovery, and she was returning to
+Ireland at once.  "Of course his arm will be practically useless for
+some time," she said, "but it will not have to come off.  So fortunate
+it was his left, and not his right.  I want him to come back with me,
+but he won't just at present.  He insists he has some business to attend
+to in town."  She laughed a little.  She seemed wonderfully happy about
+him.  Evidently, as ever, the very memory of that black afternoon had
+been wiped out by his later charm.  Paddy thought about it lingeringly.
+How strong he was when he chose.  How he compelled love and forgiveness
+if it pleased him to do so.  Was it possible, she asked again, that he
+only wanted to break her will, and bend her as he bent all others?
+
+The ache grew, and with it a manufactured anger against him.  Surely he
+might have spared her.  What did it profit him to make other men seem
+tame and colourless in her life?
+
+It was March before the message came.  Eileen's trousseau was finished
+and wedding day fixed, and Paddy had a growing dread of what lay ahead.
+Of course she was to be chief bridesmaid, and all the countryside would
+be there--and among them, Lawrence.
+
+How was she to meet him on that day, after the manner of their parting?
+See perhaps the mocking light in his eyes, and hear his veiled taunts.
+But the message dropped like a shaft from the skies, suddenly,
+unpreparedly, and for the moment dispelled all else.  It came in a note
+from Gwen.  "Lawrence is taking motor drives every day now, but hates
+going alone.  He wants you to go to-morrow morning, as I have many
+engagements.  He will call for you at the surgery at half-past eleven.
+Do be a dear about it.  I know you will--and have arranged accordingly."
+
+There was not much sleep for Paddy that night--mostly a troubled,
+tossing restlessness, and in the morning she looked eagerly at the
+weather.  It was a lovely early spring day, when the little birds were
+chirping lustily, and the little buds swelling to bursting point.
+
+And something about Lawrence seemed to match them, when at last he came.
+A veiled light in his eyes, as of some hidden joy swelling to bursting
+point.  A light gaiety of manner.  He walked into the dispensary, and
+laughed at the bottles, telling her it was the untidiest dispensary in
+London, and he was quite sure all her prescriptions included an
+appalling supply of microbes.  She tried to laugh lightly back, but she
+could not meet his eyes.  Something in his manner--something quite new--
+unnerved her.  He seemed perfectly well again, except for the slung arm,
+and when she inquired after that, he only said: "Oh, it will soon be
+equal to its work, and, anyhow, the other is strong enough now for two."
+And then he looked into her eyes and laughed a humorous, teasing,
+tender little laugh, adding: "Come along.  I've an appointment I mustn't
+miss."
+
+She was conscious of a sudden dampening.  Then he was going to see some
+one else.  Her company was not sufficient in itself.  He said something
+to the chauffeur, and they sped away, out through Acton and Ealing into
+the country, and made a wide circuit, and came back to Richmond.
+
+At half-past twelve they drew up before a quaint old-fashioned church,
+and the chauffeur got out to open the door.
+
+"Is your appointment at a church?"  Paddy asked, looking amused.  "I
+hope you won't be long, because we lunch at one."
+
+"Come in with me," he said; "I want to show you a curious old chained
+Bible here.  One of the oldest known."
+
+She alighted, still looking amused, and followed him through the big old
+door.
+
+On the threshold he was greeted by the sexton with the astonishing
+words: "Mr Elkins has just come, sir.  He is in the vestry;" and almost
+at the same moment a clergyman appeared in the chancel.
+
+Lawrence turned and looked into Paddy's eyes--and immediately she
+understood.
+
+For a breathless moment neither spoke, and she seemed to sway a little
+with the suddenness of it.  The sexton moved away and they stood
+together alone, but Paddy, was still speechless.  Then Lawrence's hand
+closed firmly over hers with a clasp that seemed to claim her for all
+eternity.  "It was the best way I could think of, mavourneen," he said;
+then he added humorously: "but it took me all my time to get the special
+licence necessary."
+
+She tried to speak, but no words would frame themselves, and her lips
+twisted queerly.
+
+"Mavourneen, are you ready?...  The one strong arm is growing
+impatient."  It was the old voice of ineffable tenderness, and it swept
+her unresistingly into his keeping.
+
+A mistiness in her eyes blotted out everything for a moment, and then
+she turned to him with a sudden uplifting of her head and squaring of
+her shoulders that gave him great joy in seeing the old dauntless Paddy
+equal to the moment.
+
+"Yes," she said simply, "I'm quite ready."
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+Finis.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Paddy-The-Next-Best-Thing, by Gertrude Page
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