e young people were gay and friendly as ever;
made him always welcome with us; and he rode over daily from desolate,
long-uninhabited Luxmore, where, in all its desolation, he appeared so
fond of abiding.

He wanted to take Maud and Walter over there one day, to see some
magnificent firs that were being cut down in a wholesale massacre,
leaving the grand old Hall as bare as a workhouse front. But the
father objected; he was clearly determined that all the hospitalities
between Luxmore and Beechwood should be on the Beechwood side.

Lord Ravenel apparently perceived this. "Luxmore is not Compiegne," he
said to me, with his dreary smile, half-sad, half-cynical. "Mr.
Halifax might indulge me with the society of his children."

And as he lay on the grass--it was full summer now--watching Maud's
white dress flit about under the trees, I saw, or fancied I saw,
something different to any former expression that had ever lighted up
the soft languid mien of William Lord Ravenel.

"How tall that child has grown lately! She is about nineteen, I think?"

"Not seventeen till December."

"Ah, so young?--Well, it is pleasant to be young!--Dear little Maud!"

He turned on one side, hiding the sun from his eyes with those delicate
ringed hands--which many a time our boys had laughed at, saying they
were mere lady's hands, fit for no work at all.

Perhaps Lord Ravenel felt the cloud that had come over our intercourse
with him; a cloud which, considering late events, was scarcely
unnatural: for when evening came, his leave-taking, always a regret,
seemed now as painful as his blase indifference to all emotions,
pleasant or unpleasant, could allow. He lingered--he hesitated--he
repeated many times how glad he should be to see Beechwood again; how
all the world was to him "flat, stale, and unprofitable," except
Beechwood.

John made no special answer; except that frank smile not without a
certain kindly satire, under which the young nobleman's Byronic
affectations generally melted away like mists in the morning. He
kindled up into warmth and manliness.

"I thank you, Mr. Halifax--I thank you heartily for all you and your
household have been to me. I trust I shall enjoy your friendship for
many years. And if, in any way, I might offer mine, or any small
influence in the world--"

"Your influence is not small," John returned earnestly. "I have often
told you so. I know no man who has wider opportunities than you have."