“I will beg your pardon humbly if I’m wrong,” said Mr. Blythe, subdued, wiping the moisture from his face, “but if you think a moment, you will see that appearances are against you. We heard of your arriving in a hurry with a young gentleman in your train; and then there came the news Miss Lily was ill--she that had stood out summer and winter against that solitude and never uttered a word--that she should just droop the moment that it might have been thought better things were coming, and company and solace--Sir Robert, I ask you----” “To believe that it was all out of terror of me!” cried Sir Robert, who had risen up and was pacing angrily about the room. “Upon my word, Blythe, you reckon on an old soldier’s self-command above what is warranted! Me, her nearest relation, that have sheltered and protected her all her life--do you mean to insinuate that Lily is ill and has a brain-fever out of dread of me?” “If you brought another man to her, knowing her wishes were a different way, and bid her take him or be turned out of your doors!” Sir Robert was not a man who feared any thing. He stood before the minister’s very face, and swore an oath that would have blown the very roof off the house had Mr. Douglas, the assistant and successor, sat in that chair. Mr. Blythe was a man of robust nerves, yet it impressed even him. “_I_ force a young man down a lassie’s throat!” cried Sir Robert in great wrath, indignation, and furious derision. “Me make matches or mar them! Is’t the decay of your faculties, Blythe, your old age, though you’re not much older than I am, or what is it that makes you launch such an accusation at me?” “There’s nothing decayed about me but my legs,” said the old minister with half a jest. “I’ll beg your pardon heartily, Sir Robert, if it’s not true.” “You deserve no explanations at my hands,” said the other, “but I’ll give them for the sake of old times. The young man was a chance acquaintance for a week’s shooting. I’ll perhaps never see him again, nor did he ever set eyes on Lily. And I have not exchanged a word with her since I came back. She knows me not--from you, or from Adam. Blythe, she is very ill, the poor lassie. She knows neither night nor day.” “Lord bless us!” said the minister, and then he put forth his large soft hand. “I beg your pardon,” he said. “See how little a thing makes a big lie and slander when it’s taken the wrong color. I was deceived, but I hope you’ll forgive. In whose hands is she? what doctor? There’s no great choice here.” “A man from the other side of the water,” said Sir Robert in the old phraseology of the countryside. “Macalister, I think.” “Well, it’s the best you can do here. Our man’s a cleverer man, if you could ever be sure of finding him with his head clear. But Macalister is an honest fellow. I would not say but I would have a man from Edinburgh if it was me.” “Do you think so?” said Sir Robert.