r invalid than ever; and he has got it into his head now
that we all of us persuaded him to try a day's stalking--a conspiracy,
as it were, to murder him. There was some accident at one of the fords,
I believe. He came home early. I never heard of his having fired at a
stag at all." And then she added, with a smile. "Mr. Moore, what made
you send me such a lot of salmon-flies?"

"Oh, well," he said, "I thought you ought to have a good stock." How
could he tell her of his vague hope that the Jock Scotts and Blue
Doctors might serve for a long time to recall him to her memory?

"I suppose you have got the stag's head by now?" she asked.

"Oh, yes, indeed; and tremendously proud of it I am," he responded,
eagerly. "You know I should never have gone deer-stalking but for you. I
made sure I was going to make a fool of myself--"

"I remember you were rather sensitive, or anxious not to miss, perhaps,"
she said, in a very gentle way. "I thought of it again last night, when
I saw you so completely master in your own sphere--so much at home--with
everything at your command--"

"Oh, yes, very much at home," he answered her, with just a touch of
bitterness. "Perhaps it is easy to be at home--in harlequinade--though
you may not quite like it." And then once more he refused to talk of the
theatre. "I am going to send old Robert some tobacco at Christmas," said
he.

"I heard of what you did already in that way," she said, smiling. "Do
you know that you may spoil a place by your extravagance? I should think
all the keepers and gillies in Strathaivron were blessing your name at
this very moment."

"And you go up in the spring, you said?"

"Yes. That is the real fishing-time. My brother Hugh and I have it all
to ourselves then; Lady Adela and the rest of them prefer London."

And then it was almost in his heart to cry out to her, "May not I, too,
go up there, if but for a single week--for six clear-shining days in the
springtime?" Ben More, Suilven, Canisp--oh, to see them once again!--and
the windy skies, and Geinig thundering down its rocky chasm, and Aivron
singing its morning song along the golden gravel of its shoals! what did
he want with any theatre?--with the harlequinade in which he was losing
his life? Could he not escape? Euston station was not so far away--and
Invershin? It seemed to him as though he had already shaken himself
free--that a gladder pulsation filled his veins--that he was breathing a
sweeter air. The