ge of late, that I verily believe that man is going mad."

"Well, he won't have far to go, at any rate," says Mr. Dare, cheerfully.
"He has been on the road, I should say, a considerable time."

CHAPTER XXVI.

"Let the dead past bury its dead."--LONGFELLOW.

JUST at first it is so delightful to Dulce to have Roger making actual
love to her, and so delightful to Roger to be able to make it, that they
are content with their present and heedless of their future.

Not that everything goes quite smoothly with them, even now. Little
skirmishes, as of old, arise between them, threatening to dim the
brightness of their days. It was, indeed, only yesterday that a very
serious rupture was near taking place, all occasioned by a difference of
opinion about the respective merits of Mr. Morton's and Messrs. Crosse &
Blackwell's pickles; Dulce declaring for the former, Roger for the
latter.

Fortunately, Mark Gore coming into the room smoothed matters over and
drew conversation into a more congenial channel, or lamentable
consequences might have ensued.

They hold to their theory about the certainty of Stephen's relenting in
due time until they grow tired of it; and as the days creep on, and
Gower sitting alone in his castle in sullen silence refuses to see or
speak to them, or give any intimation of a desire to soften towards
them, they lose heart altogether, and give themselves up a prey to
despair.

Roger one morning had plucked up courage, and had gone over to the Fens,
and had forced himself into the presence of its master and expostulated
with him "mildly but firmly," as he assured Dulce afterwards, when she
threw out broad hints to the effect that she believed he had lost his
temper on the occasion. Certainly, from all accounts, a good deal of
temper _had_ been lost, and nothing indeed came of the interview beyond
a select amount of vituperation from both sides, an openly avowed
declaration on Mr. Gower's part that as he had not requested the
pleasure of his society on this, or any other, occasion, he hoped it
would be the last time Roger would present himself at the Fens; an
equally honest avowal on the part of Mr. Dare to the effect that the
discomfort he felt in coming was _almost_ (it never could be _quite_)
balanced by the joy he experienced at departing, and a few more hot
words that very nearly led to bloodshed.

When Roger thought it all over dispassionately next morning, he told
himself tha