s gun was
distraught, and look about as though he thought the world was coming
to an end, if he missed to knock over his bird. And there is your
timid lover, who winks his eyes when he fires, who has felt certain
from the moment in which he buttoned on his knickerbockers that he
at any rate would kill nothing, and who, when he hears the loud
congratulations of his friends, cannot believe that he really did bag
that beautiful winged thing by his own prowess. The beautiful winged
thing which the timid man carries home in his bosom, declining to
have it thrown into a miscellaneous cart, so that it may never
be lost in a common crowd of game, is better to him than are the
slaughtered hecatombs to those who kill their birds by the hundred.

But Dr Crofts had so winked his eye, that he was not in the least
aware whether he had winged his bird or no. Indeed, having no one at
hand to congratulate him, he was quite sure that the bird had flown
away uninjured into the next field. "No" was the only word which Bell
had given in answer to his last sidelong question, and No is not a
comfortable word to lovers. But there had been that in Bell's No
which might have taught him that the bird was not escaping without a
wound, if he had still had any of his wits about him.

"Now I will go," said he. Then he paused for an answer, but none
came. "And you will understand what I meant when I spoke of being
turned out."

"Nobody--turns you out." And Bell, as she spoke, had almost descended
to a sob.

"It is time, at any rate, that I should go; is it not? And, Bell,
don't suppose that this little scene will keep me away from your
sister's bedside. I shall be here to-morrow, and you will find that
you will hardly know me again for the same person." Then in the dark
he put out his hand to her.

"Good-bye," she said, giving him her hand. He pressed hers very
closely, but she, though she wished to do so, could not bring herself
to return the pressure. Her hand remained passive in his, showing no
sign of offence; but it was absolutely passive.

"Good-bye, dearest friend," he said.

"Good-bye," she answered,--and then he was gone.

She waited quite still till she heard the front-door close after him,
and then she crept silently up to her own bedroom, and sat herself
down in a low rocking-chair over the fire. It was in accordance with
a custom already established that her mother should remain with Lily
till the tea was ready downstairs; for