This vehemence of feeling could not last long without producing some visible effect. When the storm had in some degree spent itself, he left the wild and solitary spot where he had given himself so entirely up to his passion, and returned towards his home; but his limbs trembled, his knees faltered, and a cold shivering vibrated through his whole frame. An intense pain was kindled in his forehead; every object reeled and shuddered to him as he passed; and, before he reached the house, he was so unwell that he immediately retired to bed. In the course of the afternoon he became delirious, and a rapid and raging fever terrified his ill-fated wife. CHAPTER XXXVIII Mr. Keelevin, when Charles had left him, sat for some time with his cheek resting on his hand, reflecting on what had passed; and in the afternoon, he ordered his horse, and rode over to Grippy, where he found the Laird sitting sullenly by himself in the easy-chair by the fire-side, with a white night-cap on his head, and grey worsted stockings drawn over his knees. ‘I’m wae, Mr. Walkinshaw,’ said the honest lawyer, as he entered the room, ‘to see you in sic an ailing condition; what’s the matter wi’ you, and how lang hae ye been sae indisposed?’ Claud had not observed his entrance; for, supposing the noise in opening the door had been made by the Leddy in her manifold household cares, or by some one of the servants, he never moved his head, but kept his eyes ruminatingly fixed on a peeling of soot that was ominously fluttering on one of the ribs of the grate, betokening, according to the most credible oracles of Scottish superstition, the arrival of a stranger, or the occurrence of some remarkable event. But, on hearing the voice of his legal friend, he turned briskly round. ‘Sit ye doun, Mr. Keelevin, sit ye doun forenent me. What’s brought you here the day? Man, this is sore weather for ane at your time o’ life to come so far afield,’ was the salutation with which he received him. ‘Aye,’ replied Mr. Keelevin, ‘baith you and me, Grippy, are beginning to be the waur o’ the wear; but I didna expek to find you in sic a condition as this. I hope it’s no the gout or the rheumatism.’ Claud, who had the natural horror of death as strong as most country gentlemen of a certain age, if not of all ages, did not much relish either the observation or the inquiries. He, however, said, with affected indifference,-- ‘No! be thankit, it’s neither the t’ane nor the t’ither, but just a waff o’ cauld that I got twa nights ago;--a bit towt that’s no worth the talking o’.’ ‘I’m extraordinar glad to hear’t; for, seeing you in sic a frail and feckless state, I was fear’t that ye were na in a way to converse on any concern o’ business. No that I hae muckle to say, but ye ken a’ sma’ things are a great fasherie to a weakly person, and I would na discompose you, Mr. Walkinshaw, unless you just felt yoursel in your right ordinar, for, at your time o’ life, ony disturbance’----