ahent."

Hugo dropped his face into his hands and did not answer. A shudder ran
through his frame more than once. Mrs. Shairp thought that he was
shedding tears, and motioned to William Whale, who had been standing
near the door with a napkin over his arm, to leave the room. William
retired shutting the door softly behind him.

Presently Hugo spoke. "Tell me about it," he said. And Mrs. Shairp was
only too happy to pour into his ears the whole story as she had learned
it from the keeper who had come upon the scene just after the firing of
the fatal shot. He listened almost in silence, but did not uncover his
face.

"And his mother?" he asked at length.

Mrs. Shairp could say little about the laird's mother. It was Dr. Muir
who had told her the truth, she said, and the whole house had heard her
cry out as if she had been struck. Then Miss Vivian had gone to her, and
had received the news from Mrs. Luttrell's own lips. They had gone
together to look at Richard's face, and then Miss Vivian had fainted,
and had been carried into Mrs. Luttrell's own room, where she was to
spend the night. So much Mrs. Shairp knew, and nothing more.

"And where is Brian?"

"Whaur should he be?" demanded the old woman, with some asperity. "Whaur
but in's ain room, sair cast doun for the ill he has dune."

"It was not his fault," said Hugo, quickly.

"Maybe no," replied Mrs. Shairp, with reserve. "Maybe ay, maybe no; it's
just the question--though I wadna like to think that the lad meant to
harm his brother."

"Who does think so?"

"I'm no saying that onybody thinks sae. Mr. Brian was aye a kind-hearted
lad an' a bonny, but never a lucky ane, sae lang as I hae kent him,
which will be twenty years gane at Marti'mas. I cam' at the term."

Hugo scarcely listened to her. He rose up with a strange, scared look
upon his face, and walked unsteadily out of the room, without a word of
thanks to Mrs. Shairp for her communications. Before she had recovered
from her astonishment, he was far down the corridor on his way to the
other portion of the house.

In which room had they laid Richard Luttrell? Hugo remembered with a
shiver that he had not asked. He glanced round the hall with a thrill of
nervous apprehension. The drawing-room and dining-room doors stood open;
they were in darkness. The little morning-room door was also slightly
ajar, but a dim light seemed to be burning inside. It must be in that
room, Hugo decided, that Richard Luttre