That night, however, the Rector heard something about Cyril having been seen a great deal down by the ford lately, and quick to take alarm, warned as he had been by earlier escapades, he began to think more seriously, and went down to the school a great deal more. "Better that than disgrace," he said; "a fresh scandal would almost kill her, poor sweet. Ah, me! she has much to bear." He sighed weakly and went to the school again, setting Sage Portlock in a flutter by his quiet paternal ways, and he came away at last avowing that if the object of his son's affections had been the daughter of a brother clergyman, he would have been delighted to find in her the child his son should bring to him to take a place within his heart. Then he began thinking about Lord Artingale and Mr Perry-Morton, and he grew angry; but again he was obliged to say to himself, It would settle Cyril perhaps. Better that than a fresh scandal. He tried to find failings in Sage--seeing in her conduct cause of offence--but without avail, for she gave him no hold whatever, and he went away thinking of her deeply, and wondering what was to be the end. Cyril Mallow smiled as he saw that he was right, and that it was only a matter of time. He liked Sage Portlock, and he told himself that he loved her passionately, and that without her he should die, and then he entered into pecuniary calculations. "The old man must leave her at least half of what he has, and every one in Lawford says he is well off, so that it will be a pleasant little bit of revenge to spend the old hunks's money for the way in which he abused me. Then there is poor mamma's money. That must come to me, so that we shall be pretty well off. Bah! it will all come right in time. But I hope Frank is not playing the fool about little Rue." After the stern encounter with the Churchwarden, and the angry words with his father, Cyril thought it prudent to keep away from Kilby Farm, and ceased to watch for Sage as she was going to or leaving school; but he rearranged his seat in the rectory pew, so that he could see her where she sat in church, became more regular than ever in his attendance, and sat through his father's sermons gazing pensively at the young schoolmistress. People said he was growing pale and thin, which was a fact easily explicable, for he smoked from morning to night, and the healthy brown of the last sea voyage was fading away consequent upon his indoor life. "If I kick up a row I shall do no good," he argued, "so I may as well wait. I could persuade her to run away with me, but then we should be confoundedly short of money till the old folks forgave us, and I'm sick of that sort of thing. No, I think the injured dodge is best, for it pays all round."