and he knew by her look that she did not
approve of his plan. "I could go away," he continued. "She could come
to you without being troubled by seeing me.

"And where would you go, Will?"

"What does it matter? To the devil, I suppose."

"Oh, Will, Will!"

"You know what I mean. I'd go anywhere. Where is she to find a home
till,--till she is married?" He had paused at the word; but was
determined not to shrink from it, and bolted it out in a loud, sharp
tone, so that both he and she recognised all the meaning of the
word,--all that was conveyed in the idea. He hated himself when he
endeavoured to conceal from his own mind any of the misery that was
coming upon him. He loved her. He could not get over it. The passion
was on him,--like a palsy, for the shaking off of which no sufficient
physical energy was left to him. It clung to him in his goings out
and comings in with a painful, wearing tenacity, against which he
would now and again struggle, swearing that it should be so no
longer,--but against which he always struggled in vain. It was with
him when he was hunting. He was ever thinking of it when the bird
rose before his gun. As he watched the furrow, as his men and horses
would drive it straight and deep through the ground, he was thinking
of her,--and not of the straightness and depth of the furrow, as had
been his wont in former years. Then he would turn away his face, and
stand alone in his field, blinded by the salt drops in his eyes,
weeping at his own weakness. And when he was quite alone, he would
stamp his foot on the ground, and throw abroad his arms, and curse
himself. What Nessus's shirt was this that had fallen upon him, and
unmanned him from the sole of his foot to the top of his head? He
went through the occupations of the week. He hunted, and shot, and
gave his orders, and paid his men their wages;--but he did it all
with a palsy of love upon him as he did it. He wanted her, and he
could not overcome the want. He could not bear to confess to himself
that the thing by which he had set so much store could never belong
to him. His sister understood it all, and sometimes he was almost
angry with her because of her understanding it. She sympathised with
him in all his moods, and sometimes he would shake away her sympathy
as though it scalded him. "Where is she to find a home till,--till
she is married?" he said.

Not a word had as yet been said between them about the property which
was now his estat