“Care!” he cried out, scornfully. “Do you think that I've watched you, in and out, for three years without caring? Do you think that I have schooled myself to put up with--with him--without caring? And when I thought that he was coming back here to--to prove himself an honourable man--I thanked the Lord. Yes, I did that. I was ready to go when I knew he was coming back for that. I told you I would go--and I meant it. I should have cut my heart out and left it here, and gone away--clean away, glorifying and praising God. But--oh, it's hideous, hideous! You are discarded--you! Cast off--you! Peerless as you are--you! Oh, my Saviour, what's this?” He broke away, and sobbed. He dashed his arm over his eyes in a rage with himself. She was very gentle with him now. She put her hand on his shoulder, and though he shook it off, put it there again. “You hurt me, Struan, really. If you are my friend, you shouldn't doubt me. I don't feel about it as you do, you know.” He lifted his head at the challenge. “Then you should,” he said. “Dog that he is. He's insulting you. He had better have died than do as he does. Damn him, he shall pay for it.” She shook her head, smiling rather dismally. “I can't talk to you any more if you don't understand why I can't talk to you,” she said. “There are things which friends cannot do for each other--which we have to do alone.” The lad gasped and made a step towards her. He could not control himself--he shook. “Not you--never you. I'll die for you--and you know it.” She looked at him full, then left him. Mrs. Wilmot stayed for the better part of a week longer than she had intended, and then, perceiving by subtle but unmistakeable signs that she would wiselier go, went. To Wanless that had been a week of strain; the air was charged with trouble. One could not have pointed to anything--it was beyond the range of weathercock or glass; but everybody felt it. Sanchia, graver than she was wont to be, pushed herself sharply from duty to duty, and avoided sympathy by a dry manner. Or she was obtuse, affecting a foolish interest in trivialities. She never went into the garden, and saw nothing of young Glyde. Mrs. Benson, glooming thunder from her brows, Minnie with scare in her russet eyes turned Purcell's feasts into fasts. The wiry tire-woman, to do her justice, was as uncomfortable as any of them; but loyalty spurred her to feats of endurance undreamed of by any but servants. They, in a world of their own, where speech is rare, and skins rarer, where everything must be done by glances and hints, are perhaps more aware of themselves than any other children of men. They are for ever judging their betters; how shall they escape from judgment of each other? Judge not, says the Book; but if you pry for vice, what can you be yourself but a prying-ground? So Purcell agonised, and felt her very vitals under the hooks. The case was past praying for. She suffered and was dumb.