a, whilst Rene stood at a humble
distance, looking with eyes of delight from her to the distant abode
of his master.

"And now you live with Sir Adrian, in that little isle yonder," said
she, at length. "How came it that you never sought to go back to your
country?"

"There was the war then, Mademoiselle, and it was difficult to
return."

"But there has been peace these six months," insisted Molly.

"Yes, Mademoiselle, though I only learned it yesterday. But then, bah!
What is that? His honour needs me. I have stopped with him seven
years, and my faith, I shall stop with him for ever."

There was a long silence.

"Does any one know," asked Molly, at length, with a vague air of
addressing the trees, mindful, as she spoke, of the manner in which
Mr. Landale had practically dismissed her and her sister at a certain
point of his version of his brother's history, "_why_ Sir Adrian has
shut himself up in that place instead of living at the Hall all this
time?"

A certain dignity seemed to come over the servant's squat figure. He
hesitated for a moment, and then said very simply, his honest eyes
fixed upon the girl's face: "I am only his humble servant,
Mademoiselle, and it is enough for me that it is his pleasure to live
alone."

"You are indeed faithful," said Molly, with a little generous flush of
shame at this peasant's delicacy compared to her own curiosity. And,
after another pause, she added, pensively: "But tell me, does Sir
Adrian never leave his solitude? I confess I should like to meet one
who had known my mother, who could talk of her to me."

Rene looked at the young girl with a wistful countenance, as though
the question had embarked him on a new train of thought. But he
answered evasively: "His honour comes rarely to Pulwick--rarely."

Molly, with a little movement of pique, rose abruptly from her seat.
But quickly changing her mood again she turned round as she was about
to depart, and smiling: "Thank you, Rene," she said, and held out her
dainty hand, which he, blushing, engulfed in his great paw, "I am
going in, I am dreadfully hungry. We shall be here two months or more,
and I shall want to see you again ... if you come back to Pulwick."

She walked quickly away towards the house. Rene followed the
retreating figure with a meditative look, so long as he could keep her
in sight, then turned his gaze to the island and there stood lost in a
deep muse, regardless of the fact that his sweetheart, M