r. When you say your
prayers, sir, pray God to leave my daughter here a little longer."

He sighed heavily; his head dropped again on his breast--he left me.

The hour advanced; the evening meal was set by my bedside. Silent Peter,
taking his leave for the night, developed into speech. "I sleep next
door," he said. "Ring when you want me." My traveling companion, taking
the second bed in the room, reposed in the happy sleep of youth. In
the house there was dead silence. Out of the house, the low song of the
night-wind, rising and falling over the lake and the moor, was the one
sound to be heard. So the first day ended in the hospitable Shetland
house.

CHAPTER XX. THE GREEN FLAG.

"I CONGRATULATE you, Mr. Germaine, on your power of painting in words.
Your description gives me a vivid idea of Mrs. Van Brandt."

"Does the portrait please you, Miss Dunross?"

"May I speak as plainly as usual?"

"Certainly!"

"Well, then, plainly, I don't like your Mrs. Van Brandt."

Ten days had passed; and thus far Miss Dunross had made her way into my
confidence already!

By what means had she induced me to trust her with those secret and
sacred sorrows of my life which I had hitherto kept for my mother's
ear alone? I can easily recall the rapid and subtle manner in which her
sympathies twined themselves round mine; but I fail entirely to trace
the infinite gradations of approach by which she surprised and conquered
my habitual reserve. The strongest influence of all, the influence of
the eye, was not hers. When the light was admitted into the room she was
shrouded in her veil. At all other times the curtains were drawn, the
screen was before the fire--I could see dimly the outline of her face,
and I could see no more. The secret of her influence was perhaps partly
attributable to the simple and sisterly manner in which she spoke to me,
and partly to the indescribable interest which associated itself with
her mere presence in the room. Her father had told me that she "carried
the air of heaven with her." In my experience, I can only say that she
carried something with her which softly and inscrutably possessed itself
of my will, and made me as unconsciously obedient to her wishes as if I
had been her dog. The love-story of my boyhood, in all its particulars,
down even to the gift of the green flag; the mystic predictions of Dame
Dermody; the loss of every trace of my little Mary of former days; the
rescue of Mrs. Van Brandt f