nd, far away, rose the melancholy, velvet-soft
hooting of an owl.

Sylvia's voice, close to him, said:

"Mark, that night when your star caught in my hair? Do you remember?"

Yes, he remembered. And in his drowsy mind just roused from dreams,
there turned and turned the queer nonsensical refrain: "I
never--never--will desert Mr. Micawber. . . ."

A pleasant month that--of reading, and walking with the dogs the country
round, of lying out long hours amongst the boulders or along the river
banks, watching beasts and birds.

The little old green-house temple of his early masterpieces was still
extant, used now to protect watering pots. But no vestige of impulse
towards work came to him down there. He was marking time; not restless,
not bored, just waiting--but for what, he had no notion. And Sylvia, at
any rate, was happy, blooming in these old haunts, losing her fairness in
the sun; even taking again to a sunbonnet, which made her look
extraordinarily young. The trout that poor old Gordy had so harried were
left undisturbed. No gun was fired; rabbits, pigeons, even the few
partridges enjoyed those first days of autumn unmolested. The bracken
and leaves turned very early, so that the park in the hazy September
sunlight had an almost golden hue. A gentle mellowness reigned over all
that holiday. And from Ireland came no further news, save one picture
postcard with the words: "This is our house.--NELL."

In the last week of September they went back to London. And at once
there began in him again that restless, unreasonable aching--that sense
of being drawn away out of himself; so that he once more took to walking
the Park for hours, over grass already strewn with leaves, always
looking--craving--and for what?

At Dromore's the confidential man did not know when his master would be
back; he had gone to Scotland with Miss Nell after the St. Leger. Was
Lennan disappointed? Not so--relieved, rather. But his ache was there
all the time, feeding on its secrecy and loneliness, unmentionable
feeling that it was. Why had he not realized long ago that youth was
over, passion done with, autumn upon him? How never grasped the fact
that 'Time steals away'? And, as before, the only refuge was in work.
The sheep--dogs and 'The Girl on the Magpie Horse' were finished. He
began a fantastic 'relief'--a nymph peering from behind a rock, and a
wild-eyed man creeping, through reeds, towards her. If he could put into
the