It startled Lumsden very much that no wail of distress, no indignant outcry, came from Lily on discovering her loss. These were not the days of frequent communications. People had not yet acquired the habit of constant correspondence. They were accustomed to wait for news, with no swift possibility of a telegram or even a penny post to make them impatient; not, perhaps, that they would have grudged--certainly not that Ronald would have grudged--the eightpence which was then, I think, the price of the conveyance of a letter from one end of Scotland to the other, but that they had not acquired the custom of frequent writing. When no protest, no remonstrance, no passionate outcry, reached him for a week or two after the event, Lumsden became exceedingly alarmed. He said to himself at first that it was a relief, that Lily herself recognized the necessity and had yielded to it; but he did not really believe this, and as the days went on, genuine anxiety and terror were in his mind. Had it killed her? Had his Lily, in her weakness, bowed her head and died of this outrage? the worst, he now felt in every fibre of his being, to which a woman could be subjected. He wrote, enclosing his letter to Beenie; then he wrote to Beenie herself, entreating her to send him a line, a word. But Lily was unconscious of every thing, and Beenie of all that did not concern her mistress, when these letters arrived. They were not even opened until Lily was convalescent, and then Beenie by her mistress’s orders, in her large sprawling handwriting, and with many tears, replied briefly to the three or four anxious demands for news which had arrived one after the other. Beenie wrote: “SIR: My mistress has been at the point of death with what they call a brain-fever. It has lasted the longest and been the fiercest that ever the doctor saw. She is coming round now--the Lord be praised--but very slow. She has but one thought--you will know well what that is--and will never rest till she has got satisfaction, night or day. “I am, sir, “Your obedient servant, “ROBINA RUTHERFORD. “P. S.--I was to tell you the last part, for it is not from me.”