ere was a strange elation, a
sort of triumph, in his tone.

"Why, Gerty, do you know why I have come to London? It is to carry you
off--not with the pipes yelling to drown your screams, as Flora
Macdonald's mother was carried off by her lover, but taking you by the
hand, and waiting for the smile on your face. That is the way out of all
our troubles, Gerty: we shall be plagued with no more words then. Oh, I
understand it all, sweetheart--your doubts of yourself, and your
thinking about the stage: it is all a return of the old and evil
influences that you and I thought had been shaken off forever. Perhaps
that was a little mistake; but no matter. You will shake them off now,
Gerty. You will show yourself to have the courage of a woman. It is but
one step, and you are free! Gerty," said he, with a smile on his face,
"do you know what that is?"

He took from his pocket a printed document, and opened it. Certain
words there that caught her eye caused her to turn even paler than she
had been; and she would not even touch the paper. He put it back.

"Are you frightened, sweetheart? No! You will take this one step, and
you will see how all those fancies and doubts will disappear forever!
Oh, Gerty, when I got this paper into my pocket to-day, and came out
into the street, I was laughing to myself; and a poor woman said, 'You
are very merry, sir; will you give a poor old woman a copper?' 'Well,' I
said, 'here is a sovereign for you, and perhaps you will be merry
too?'--and I would have given every one a sovereign, if I had had it to
give. But do you know what I was laughing at?--I was laughing to think
what Captain Macallum would do when you went on board as my wife. For he
put up the flags for you when you were only a visitor coming to Dare;
but when I take you by the hand, Gerty, as you are going along the
gangway, and when we get on to the paddle-box, and Captain Macallum
comes forward, and when I tell him that you are now my wife, why, he
will not know what to do to welcome you! And Hamish, too--I think Hamish
will go mad that day. And then, sweetheart, you will go along to
Erraidh, and you will go up to the signal-house on the rocks, and we
will fire a cannon to tell the men at Dubh-Artach to look out. And what
will be the message you will signal to them, Gerty, with the great white
boards? Will you send them your compliments, which is the English way?
Ah, but I know what they will answer to you. They will answer in the