how his heart was toward her. His pleasure when he
heard that she had been there, his childish delight in anything that
she had brought for him, the feverishness with which he waited to hear
her step, her voice from a distance, always demanding that the doors
should be left open so that he might hear her,--all betrayed to his
mother as plainly as confession would have done the real thoughts of
his heart, and cast a trouble into her own whence she saw no present
satisfactory issue. Though she was fond of Leam now, and grateful to
her for her faithful visits during Alick's illness, yet, just as Edgar
doubted of her fitness as a wife for the master of the Hill, so did
she doubt of her fitness as a daughter-in-law for Steel's Corner. As a
friend she was pleasant enough, with her quaint ways and pretty face;
but as one of the Corfield family, bound to them for ever--what then
would she be? But again, if Alick really loved her, she would not like
to see him disappointed. So, what between her dislike to the marriage
should it ever be, and her fear for Alick's unhappiness should he ask
and be refused, the poor mother was in a state of confused feelings
and contradictory wishes which did not agree with a nature like hers,
given to mathematical certainties and averse to loose ends and frayed
edges anywhere. As nothing more was to be got out of Leam at this
moment, and as Mrs. Corfield knew that Alick would be impatient, they
went into the drawing-room together, Leam carrying her basket of
spring flowers for her old friend.

It was pitiful to see the poor fellow. Thin, gaunt, plainer than ever,
if also ennobled by that almost saintly dignity which is given by
illness, the first impression made on Leam was one of acute physical
repulsion: the second only gave room to compassion. Fortunately, that
little shudder of hers was unnoticed, and Alick saw only the beloved
face, more beautiful to him than anything out of heaven, with its
grave intensity of look that seemed so full of thought and feeling,
turned to him--saw only those glorious eyes fixed once more straight
on his--felt only the small hand which seemed to give him new life
to touch lying clasped in his own, weak, wasted, whitened, like a dead
hand for color against the warm olive of her skin. It was almost worth
while to have been separated so long to have this joy of meeting; and
he thought his pain and danger not too dearly bought by this exquisite
pleasure of knowing that