yself to a bit more play and come down on the
Governor for an extra cheque now and again. Lots of fellows come a
worse cropper than that--"

Darsie wondered if a "worse cropper" might not possibly be a less
serious ill than persistent slacking and irresponsibility; but now that
the bad news was out, Ralph was fast regaining his composure.

"I'll turn out all right yet, Darsie, you'll see. The tenants like me.
I'll settle down and make a first-rate squire when my time comes. And
I'll make up to you then for all this worry and bother." For a moment
his voice was significantly tender, then the recollection of his present
difficulty swept over him once more, and he added hastily: "You'll--
you'll break it to the mater, won't you? About that money, I mean.
She'll take it best from you--"

Darsie rose from her seat, and stood before him, tall and white in the
moonlight.

"No!" she said clearly. "I will not. You must make your own
confession. Things have been made easy for you all your life, Ralph.
Now you must fight for yourself."

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ralph bore no malice; even his momentary irritation at finding himself,
as he considered, "left in the lurch," lasted but a few moments after
his return to the hall. Darsie would rather have had it last a little
longer. To see an unclouded face, to catch the echo of merry laughter
within ten minutes of a humiliating confession, seemed but another
instance of instability of character. It seemed literally impossible
for Ralph to feel deeply on any subject for more than a few moments at a
time; nevertheless, such was the charm of his personality that she felt
both pleased and flattered when twelve o'clock approached and he came
smilingly forward to lead her to her place in the great ring encircling
the whole room. "I must have you and mother--one on either side," he
said, and as they crossed the floor together Darsie was conscious that
every eye in the room followed them with a smiling significance. The
young Squire, and the pretty young lady who was his sister's friend--a
nice pair they made, to be sure! Every brain was busy with dreams of
the future, weaving romantic plans, seeing in imagination other scenes
like the present, with Darsie in the place of hostess. She knew it,
divined instinctively that Ralph knew it too, felt the recognition of it
in the grip of Noreen's hand, in the tender pathos of Mrs Pe