'I thank ye for trying to help me, sir,' said old Duncan Ged, who stood in the hall, bonnet in hand, and apparently quite crushed by the non-renewal of his lease; 'but Hawkey Sharpe is the hardest agent between the Forth an' Tay; he turns the puir out o' house and hame at a minute's notice, and counts every hare and rabbit in the woods. E'en's ye like, Mr. Sharpe!' said the old man, shaking his clenched hand in the direction of the library door; 'ilka man buckles his belt his ain gate, as I maun buckle mine. Everything has an end, and a pudding has twa.' And thus strangely consoling himself, he took his departure. Roland sent the old man by post a cheque for fifty pounds; he could do no more at that time. 'But for dear Maude's sake,' thought Roland, 'I should certainly never set foot in Earlshaugh till these matters of mine are cleared up--and perhaps never again! But I'll make no fracas till after the covert shooting is over and our guests are gone; _then_, by Jove; won't I bring Mr. Hawkey Sharpe and this grim stepmother to book, if I can!' CHAPTER XIV. MAUDE'S SECRET. Roland had got a suitable mount from old Buckle and gone for 'a spin,' to leave, if possible, his worries and fidgets behind him, away by Radernie and as far as Carnbee, where the green hills that culminate in conical Kellie Law look down on the Firth of Forth and the dark blue German Sea; while Maude--after being down at Spens the poacher's cottage with money and sundry comforts for his starving wife and children--full of the subject of Roland's return and the approaching visit of her _fiancé_, Jack Elliot, had written a long, effusive, and young girl-like epistle to the latter, and was on her way to slip it into the locked letter-bag in the hall with her own hand. She had a consciousness that she was watched, and with it no desire that her correspondence should be discussed just then, as she had a nervous dread of Mr. Hawkey Sharpe, who had actually and presumptuously ventured on more than one occasion to evince some unmistakable tenderness towards her--an indiscretion, to say the least of it, of which she dared give no hint to her fiery brother; but which was the source of much disquietude to poor Maude, and of confusion and distress to her, as regarded the steward's power in the house, and made her change colour at the mere mention of his name. And now when passing through a long and lonely wainscotted corridor, the windows of which on one side overlooked the haugh beneath the house, and which led to the great staircase, she came suddenly upon the very object of her dread, Mr. Sharpe, and hastily thrust her letter into the bosom of her dress.