And Olive--did she ever regret the step which had linked her lot to his, burdened as it was with a secret grief in which she had no share? Never, for the fraction of a moment. Always brave, loving, and patient, she strove to lighten his load. Even when suffering from a temporary depression of spirits herself, she would brace herself with an effort and cast care away in order that she might cheer him. She studied his moods, and when in her clear-sightedness she saw the dark hour about to come upon him, any sacrifice of her own comfort and convenience did she deem of small account if only she could keep up his spirits and lift him out of himself. And she had her reward. Never was he so happy as when alone with her--and as amid the night horrors of the fatal cave, with the wild waters surging around them, he had found refuge in her slumbering innocence and purity from the supernatural terrors which came crowding in, thick and fast, upon his soul, so now, in his dark and conscience-stricken moods, hers was the image that caused the evil spirit to fly; her tones, the music that rendered his ears deaf to the accusing voice; hers the protecting presence, beneath the weight of the ever-threatening cloud which he felt would sooner or later descend upon him and overwhelm him in his doom. Yet why should it? No human eye witnessed that moonlight tragedy. Already the circumstances had faded into past history; nor at the time had any suspicion of violence arisen to fix people's memory. But for all that, Roland was as firmly convinced that sooner or later the reckoning would overtake him, as that he himself was a living man, and when it did, he had little enough doubt as to the issue. And now, as we see him once more after two years, that crisis seems to him within measurable distance. CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN. EUSTACE OUTFLANKED. General Dorrien's widow occupied a semi-detached villa in Maida Vale. She had, as we have seen, persistently and even fiercely refused her son's repeated offers of a settlement, liberal and freely made as they were, preferring to live on her own not very ample means to accepting a penny from him whom, without a shred of evidence to justify her in the idea, she persisted in regarding as responsible for his brother's death. The difference in her mode of living was a trifle, she declared. At Cranston, they had always lived very quietly, so it was in no sense a "come-down." Poor Nellie, however, had felt the change acutely, and although she tried dutifully to make the best of it, the exclusive society of a gloomy parent told upon her spirits, and the smoke-defiled air of suburban London was a poor substitute for the strong ozone of the sea. Consequently, the girl became seriously ailing, and there was nothing for it but to send her away for a change.