'You do not know Roy as well as I do. I believe he is physically as well as morally unfit to cope with a great sorrow; where other men fight, he succumbs too readily.' 'You have your trouble too, Cardie; he should remember that.' 'I have not lost hope, Aunt Milly,' he returned, gravely. 'I am happier than Rex--far happier; for it is no wrong for me to love Ethel. I have a right to love her, so long as no one else wins her. Roy will have it Polly has jilted him for Heriot.' 'Jilted him! that child!' 'Yes, he maintains that she loves him best, only that she is unconscious of her own feelings. He declares that to his belief she has never really given her heart to Heriot. I am afraid he is right in declaring the whole thing has been patched up too hastily. It has always seemed to me as though Polly were too young to know her own mind.' 'Some girls are married at eighteen.' 'Yes, but not Polly; look what a child she is, and how quiet a life she has led for the last three years; she has seen no one but ourselves, Marsden, and Heriot; do you know, gentle as he is, she seems half afraid of him.' 'That is only natural in her position.' 'You think it does not augur want of love? Well, you may be right; I only profess to understand one girl,'--with a sigh--'and I can read her like a book; but Roy, Aunt Milly--what must we do about Roy?' Mildred shook her head dejectedly. 'He must not come here under the circumstances, it would not be possible or right; he has done mischief enough already.' 'Surely he did not betray himself?' in Richard's sternest voice; 'he assured me over and over again that he had not said a word which Dr. Heriot might not hear.' 'No; he commanded himself wonderfully; he only forgot himself once, and then, poor lad, he recollected himself in time,--but she must have noticed how badly it went with him--there was heart-break in his face.' 'I had sad work with him for the first two miles,' returned Richard. 'I was half afraid of leaving him at all, he looked and spoke so wildly, only my threat of telling my father brought him to reason; he begged--he implored me to keep his secret, and that no one but you and I should ever know of his madness.' 'There would be nothing gained by telling my brother,' returned Mildred. 'Certainly not; it would be perfectly useless, and fret him beyond measure; he would take Roy's trouble to heart, and have no pleasure in anything. How thankful I am, Aunt Milly, that I have already planned my London journey for the day after to-morrow.' 'Yes, indeed, I shall feel easier when he is under your care.' 'I must invent some excuse for being absent most of the day to-morrow; I cannot bear to think of him shut up in that wretched inn, and unable to stir out for fear of being recognised. He was very lame, I remember; I must find out if he has really injured his foot.'