There was no more noise that night. Wildney and the rest slunk off ashamed and frightened, and Eric, leaving his candle flaring on the table, went down to his bedroom, where he was very sick. He had neither strength nor spirit to undress, and flung himself into bed just as he was. When they heard that he was gone, Owen and Duncan (for Montagu was silent and melancholy) went into his study, put out the candle, and only just cleared away, to the best of their power, the traces of the carouse, when Dr Rowlands came up stairs on his usual nightly rounds. They had been lighting brown paper to take away the fumes of the brandy, and the Doctor asked them casually the cause of the smell of burning. Neither of them answered, and seeing Owen there, in whom he placed implicit trust, the Doctor thought no more about it. Eric awoke with a bad headache, and a sense of shame and sickness. When he got up he felt most wretched; and while washing he thought to himself, "Ah! that I could thus wash away the memory of last night!" Of course, after what had occurred, Eric and Montagu were no longer on speaking terms, and miserable as poor Eric felt when he saw how his blow had bruised and disfigured his friend's face, he made no advances. He longed, indeed, from his inmost heart, to be reconciled to him; but feeling that he had done grievous wrong, he dreaded a repulse, and his pride would not suffer him to run the risk. So he pretended to feel no regret, and, supported by his late boon companions, represented the matter as occurring in the defence of Wildney, whom Montagu was bullying. Montagu, too, was very miserable; but he felt that, although ready to forgive Eric, he could not, in common self-respect, take the first step to a reconciliation; indeed, he rightly thought that it was not for Eric's good that he should do so. "You and Williams appear never to speak to each other now," said Mr Rose. "I am sorry for it, Monty; I think you are the only boy who has any influence over him." "I fear you are mistaken, sir, in that. Little Wildney has much more." "Wildney?" asked Mr Rose, in sorrowful surprise. "Wildney more influence than _you_?" "Yes, sir." "Ah, that our poor Edwin had lived!" So, with a sigh, Walter Rose and Harry Montagu buried their friendship for Eric until happier days. VOLUME TWO, CHAPTER SIX. ERIC AND MONTAGU. And constancy lives in realms above; And life is thorny; and youth is vain; And to be wroth with one we love Doth work like madness in the brain. Each spoke words of high disdain, And insult to his heart's best brother. _Coleridge's Christabel_.