arrive; those hateful nuptials, dooming Fawley as the nuptials of Paris and Helen had doomed Troy, would be finally arranged. In another week the work of demolition would commence. He never meant to leave Darrell to superintend that work. No; grumble and refuse as he might till the last moment, he knew well enough that, when it came to the point, he, Richard Fairthorn, must endure any torture that could save Guy Darrell from a pang. A voice comes singing low through the grove—the patter of feet on the crisp leaves. He looks up; Sir Isaac is scrutinizing him gravely—behind Sir Isaac, Darrell's own doe, led patiently by Sophy—yes, lending its faithless neck to that female criminal's destroying hand. He could not bear that sight, which added insult to injury. He scrambled up—darted a kick at Sir Isaac—snatched the doe from the girl's hand, and looked her in the face (her—not Sophy, but the doe) with a reproach that, if the brute had not been lost to all sense of shame, would have cut her to the heart; then, turning to Sophy, he said: "No, Miss! I reared this creature—fed it with my own hands, Miss. I gave it up to Guy Darrell, Miss; and you sha'n't steal this from him, whatever else you may do, Miss."
Sophy. "Indeed, Mr. Fairthorn, it was for Mr. Darrell's sake that I wished to make friends with the doe—as you would with poor Sir Isaac, if you would but try and like me—a little, only a very little, Mr. Fairthorn."
Fairthorn. "Don't!"
Sophy. "Don't what? I am so sorry to see I have annoyed you somehow. You have not been the same person to me the last two or three days. Tell me what I have done wrong; scold me, but make it up."
Fairthorn. "Don't hold out your hand to me! Don't be smiling in my face! I don't choose it! Get out of my sight! You are standing between me and the old house—robbing me even of my last looks at the home which you—"
Sophy. "Which I—what?"
Fairthorn. "Don't I say, don't—don't tempt me. You had better not ask questions—that's all. I shall tell you the truth; I know I shall; my tongue is itching to tell it. Please to walk on."
Despite the grotesque manner and astounding rudeness of the flute-player, his distress of mind was so evident—there was something so genuine and earnest at the bottom of his ludicrous anger—that Sophy began to feel a vague presentiment of evil. That she was the mysterious cause of some great suffering to this strange enemy, whom she had unconsciously provoked, was
