"This is the second accident of just the same sort that I have been in," continued Hardy. "The other was at the earl's, when I was a youngster. Not Mr. Cleveland's father, you know, sir; t'other earl afore him, over at t'other place. Two red-coat blades had come down there for a week's sport, and one of 'em (he seemed to us keepers as if he had never handled a gun in all his born days) got the shot into the other's calf--just as it has been got this evening into the Squire's. That was a worse accident, though, than this will be, I hope. He was laid up at the inn, close by where it happened, for six weeks, for they thought it best not to carry him to the Hall, and then----" "And then--did it terminate fatally?" interrupted Robert, scarcely above his breath. "Law, no, sir! At the end of the six weeks he was on his legs, as strong as ever, and went back to London--or wherever it was he came from." Robert Dalrymple drew a relieved breath. "I shall go in and hear what the surgeons say," said he, restlessly. "And you go round to the kitchen, Hardy, and tell them to give you some tea; or anything else you'd like." Miss Lynn was in the oak-parlour alone, standing before the fire, when Robert entered. "Oh, Robert," she said, "I wanted to see you. Do you fear this will be very bad?--very serious?" "I don't know," was the desponding answer. "Whose gun was it that did the mischief?" "Whose gun! Have you not heard?" he broke forth, in tones of fierce self-reproach. "MINE, of course. And if he dies, I shall have murdered him." Mary Lynn was used to Robert's heroics; but she looked terribly grieved now. "I see what you think, Mary," he said, being in the mood to view all things in a gloomy light: "that you will be better without me than with me. Cancel our engagement, if you will. I cannot say that I do not deserve it." "No, Robert, I was not thinking of that," she answered. Tears rose to her eyes, and glistened in the firelight. "I was wondering whether I could say or do anything to induce you to be less thoughtless; less----" "Less like a fool. Say it out, Mary." "You are anything but that, and you know it. Only you will act so much upon impulse. You think, speak, move and act without the slightest deliberation or forethought. It is all random impulse." "Impulse could hardly have been at fault here, Mary. It was a horrible accident, and I shall deplore it to the last hour of my life." "How did it happen?" "I cannot tell. I had been speaking with Lee, gun in hand, and was turning short round to catch up the others, when the gun went off. Possibly the trigger caught my coat-sleeve--I cannot tell. Yes, that was pure accident, Mary: but there's something worse connected with it." "What do you mean?"