And Miss Jane did—having her own cry out later by herself—while the steamer started into the black, wintry night, and Jack stood watching it from Greenore pier, with a mist before his eyes and a queer huskiness in his throat. Just when life was opening for him with all its sweetest and best, it seemed hard, indeed, that Paddy—his old chum and playmate—should be assailed with this trouble of which she would not speak, and in which apparently none of them could help her. Jack cared just as much as his present happiness made it possible for him to care about anything. Long ago, though he only remembered it with a smile, the sole problem of his life had been which of the sisters he loved the best. Fate had tipped the balance to the elder’s side, without in any measure depreciating the other; but Jack never knew, and never would know, what a difference that final choice had made to Paddy. CHAPTER XLIII A Man’s Pain. Lawrence received his first intimation of what had happened through Gwen; as Paddy had foreseen. He had been sitting most of the morning in his den, with the London newspapers, the lovers having all taken themselves off, with an air that forbade any one to follow on their peril, but he had not done much reading. Small wonder, indeed! Why read of stocks and shares, of wars and rumours of Wars, of the vagaries of Cabinet Ministers, and the sweet, childlike levity of Irish members—when the happiness for which your whole life seems to have been waiting is coming to you to-day? No, Lawrence did not read, he sat instead, gazing into the fire, making delightful plans for the future, in which Paddy was all in all. The chair she had sat in was pulled up to the hearth, but he had not used it since; he felt it was her chair now, and his fancy loved to see her sitting there still, with her two little hands clasping the two arms, and her head leaning back with that slight air of weariness which somehow made her only the more enchanting. He was strangely happy that one morning, there had never been anything in all his life before in the least like it. In the afternoon he meant to go and look for her by the loch; he believed she would be waiting for him—and if not, well he would go to the Parsonage and claim her. He went over the interview in his fancy, detail by detail, as it might be, as he would like it to be. Paddy would be shy, that was a delicious thought to him. He had known too many of the women who meet a man half-way without the slightest qualm, and practically thrust his first kiss upon him, thinking of it only as one of many to follow. How different it would be with Paddy! He even wondered, with a little inward smile, whether she would let him kiss her at all this first interview, or at any rate before they were just parting. He did not mean to press her or hurry her in any way. Once having her promise, he could afford to wait.