"I can't help that; Rabelais is to be blamed for it. I am quoting him, and it is to be found in his prologue to the chapters on the Moderation of Wishes. And apropos of 'moderate wishes in point of hatchet,' I want you to understand that I ask but little from Heaven. I fling but the helve after the hatchet that has sunk into the silent stream. I want the other half of the weapon that is buried fathom deep, and for want of which the thick woods darken round me by the Sacred River, and I can catch not a glimpse of the stars." "In plain English," said Audley Egerton, "you want"--he stopped short, puzzled. "I want my purpose and my will, and my old character, and the nature God gave me. I want the half of my soul which has fallen from me. I want such love as may replace to me the vanished affections. Reason not--I throw the helve after the hatchet." CHAPTER XXI. Randal Leslie, on leaving Audley, repaired to Frank's lodgings, and after being closeted with the young guardsman an hour or so, took his way to Limmer's hotel, and asked for Mr. Hazeldean. He was shown into the coffee-room, while the waiter went up stairs with his card, to see if the Squire was within, and disengaged. The _Times_ newspaper lay sprawling on one of the tables, and Randal, leaning over it, looked with attention into the column containing births, deaths, and marriages. But in that long and miscellaneous list, he could not conjecture the name which had so excited Mr. Egerton's interest. "Vexatious!" he muttered; "there is no knowledge which has power more useful than that of the secrets of men." He turned as the waiter entered, and said that Mr. Hazeldean would be glad to see him. As Randal entered the drawing-room, the Squire shaking hands with him, looked towards the door as if expecting some one else, and his honest face assumed a blank expression of disappointment when the door closed, and he found that Randal was unaccompanied. "Well," said he bluntly, "I thought your old school-fellow, Frank, might have been with you." "Have not you seen him yet, sir?" "No, I came to town this morning; travelled outside the mail; sent to his barracks, but the young gentleman does not sleep there--has an apartment of his own; he never told me that. We are a plain family, the Hazeldeans--young sir; and I hate being kept in the dark, by my own son too." Randal made no answer, but looked sorrowful. The Squire, who had never before seen his kinsman, had a vague idea that it was not quite polite to entertain a stranger, though a connection to himself, with his family troubles, and so resumed good-naturedly: "I am very glad to make your acquaintance at last, Mr. Leslie. You know, I hope, that you have good Hazeldean blood in your veins?" _Randal_, (smilingly).--"I am not likely to forget that; it is the boast of our pedigree."