“I went to the Parsonage first,” he continued, “and they told me you had gone out directly after lunch, and they believed you were sailing. I went down to the beach and found the boat, and decided you had taken a walk instead, and came to look for you. I was lucky to find you in such an out-of-the-way corner. Are you quite all right again!” He was still keeping his eyes from her, playing with the twig, and Paddy unconsciously clenched her hands hard in her effort to feel collected. “Yes, thank you!” She hesitated, still looking hard at the loch. Then she gulped down a long breath and took the plunge. “I am glad you have come. I have been wanting to see you.” She noticed suddenly that he looked white and ill, and his face was a little drawn. “Have you been ill?” “No, I have not been ill, only worried. I should have come sooner—only—” he hesitated. “I wanted to see you to thank you,” she interrupted. “Of course I know you risked your life to save mine. I might easily have died up there with the cold—and you might easily have slipped into a bog looking for me. No—” as he tried to stop her, “I must go on. Don’t you see how it’s just strangling me to remember that you risked so much—after—after—” her voice died away, she could find no words. She knew all in a moment that the casual acquaintance of the last three weeks was once more the lover, and the further complication unnerved her. “As if that made any difference,” a little harshly. “Haven’t I told you that your scorn and threats cannot in any way change me—and never will. Good God! do you suppose I care two straws about risking my twopenny-halfpenny life when it is for you?” She shrank away visibly, and he changed his manner. “There, I don’t want to worry you—but for Heaven’s sake don’t thank me. I can’t stand it. There can be no question of thanks between you and me.” “But how can I help it?” she cried a little piteously. “Don’t you understand that I _must_ thank you—that it is the one and only return I can make?” He looked into her face a moment and decided to humour her. “Very well, only let us consider it finished. If it eases your mind, I will accept your gratitude; but I must be allowed to add it is absolutely uncalled-for, seeing I would risk a dozen lives for you cheerfully any day.” Her eyes fell before his, and she clenched her hands yet harder. Then he quite suddenly changed the subject. “They tell me you are going back to London in two days. Is that so?” “Yes.” “How you must hate it?” He looked round at the gleaming, beautiful loch and the mountains beyond. “It must be desperately hard to go back.” She could not trust herself to speak, and he continued in a voice that had suddenly grown dangerously sympathetic. “I always think it is harder for you than the others. Your mother and Eileen always have each other, and any one can see how much that means to both. But you, somehow—since the dear old General died—seem to have had no one to take his place.”