Dulcie, we have said, had been wont to scamper about the Devonshire lanes, where the clustered apples grew thick overhead, on her Welsh cob, and now on horseback she felt at home in her own sphere again; her colour mounted, her blue eyes sparkled, and the girl looked beautiful indeed. She almost felt supremely happy; and Finella laughed as she watched her enjoying the sensations of power and management, and the independence given by horse-exercise--the life, the stir, the action, and joyous excitement of a thorough good 'spin' along a breezy country road. Shafto, however, was in a sullen temper, and vowed secretly that never again would he act their cavalier, because the girls either ignored him by talking to each other, or only replied to any remarks he ventured to make and these were seldom of an amusing or original nature. Indeed, he felt painfully and savagely how hateful his presence was to both. Despite Lady Fettercairn, other rides followed, for Finella was difficult to control, and in her impulsive and coaxing ways proved generally irrepressible. Thus she took Dulcie all over the country: to the ruined castle of Fettercairn, to Den Finella, and to the great cascade--a perpendicular rock, more than seventy feet high, over which the Finella River pours on its way from Garvock, where it rises, to the sea at Johnshaven. Returning slowly from one of these rides, with their pads at a walking pace, with the groom a long way in their rear, Dulcie, breaking a long silence, during which both seemed to be lost in thought, said: 'Troubles are doubly hard to bear when we have to keep them to ourselves; thus I feel happier, at least easier in mind, now that I have told you all about poor Florian.' 'And I, that I have told you about Captain Hammersley,' replied Finella; 'though of course I shall never see him again.' 'Never--why so?' 'After what he saw, and what he no doubt thinks, how can I expect to do so? My greatest affliction is that I must seem so black in his eyes. Yet it is impossible for me not to feel the deepest and most tender interest in him--to watch with aching heart the news from the seat of war, and all the movements of his regiment--the movements in which he must have a share.' 'Things cannot, nay, must not, go on thus between you. The false position should be cleared up, explained away. What is to be done?' 'Grin and bear it, as the saying is, Dulcie. Nothing can avail us now--nothing,' said Finella, with a break in her voice.' 'Finella, let me help you and him.' 'How?' 'I shall write about it to Florian. I mean to write him now, at all events.'