It was for this cause that Hubert shunned all intercourse with the Randolph family, as he did with all others--a resolution strengthened in their case by the generous motives Gabriel had assigned to him; for whatever might have been the reasons of this latter for pronouncing his eulogium, he had said no more than the truth in his account of his character. When Hubert Lyle had gone through the mental process we have detailed, very deep was the calm that entered into his soul. It became like the pure waters of a deep still well, walled in and protected from all sights and sounds of the world without, and with the light and the glory of heaven alone mirrored within it. And why, then, was the quiet now gone from his heart, and the repose from his eyes? Why did he look up with that earnest gaze to the evening sky, as though some shadow had come over its brightness? It was because the terror had come upon him, that the greatest enemy he ever could know in this life was about to rise up from its deathlike torpor and assail him--even his own human nature; he felt that all those natural feelings and passions which he had crushed down deep into his heart as unto a grave, were now stirring themselves like men that had been buried alive, and were waking in torture; they _would_ live, they were bursting the cerements of that strong heart. How were they to be beaten to death again? There--rampant and fierce was the craving for sympathy, for love. There, sickening in its intensity, was the yearning to give and to receive that greatest of earthly gifts, the blessing of a mutual pure affection; the heart moulded from dust reasserted its birthright, and cried out for its kindred dust. It was not that these feelings were as yet at work with any definite object within Hubert Lyle, it was but the shadow and the prophecy of them that lay upon him, like a thick cloud charged with lightning.