"And so should I: but I expect, from the last accounts which I received from him, that the ship will have left her station to return home before our letters can arrive there. My plan is, to keep quiet until his return. The facts are known, and can be established by us alone. Let us immediately take such precautions as our legal advisers my think requisite, that proofs may not be wanting in case of our sudden demise; but we must not act until he arrives in the country, for Mr Rainscourt is a difficult and dangerous person to deal with." "You are right," replied the vicar; "when do you leave this [house] for Ireland?" "In a few days--but I shall be ready to appear the moment that I hear of the ship's arrival. In the meantime, I shall make the necessary affidavits, in case of accident." McElvina and the vicar separated. McElvina, like a dutiful husband, communicated the joyful intelligence to his wife, and his wife, to soothe Emily under her affliction, although she kept the secret, now talked of Seymour. In a few days the arrangements were made--the cottage was put into an agent's hands to be disposed of; and, quitting with regret an abode in which they had passed some years of unalloyed happiness, they set off for Galway, where they found Rainscourt on their arrival. Consigning his daughter to his care, they removed to their own house, which was on the property which McElvina had purchased, and about four miles distant from the castle. McElvina's name was a passport to the hearts of his tenants, who declared that the head of the house had come unto his own again. That he had the true eye of the McElvinas, there was no mistaking, for no other family had such an eye. That his honour had gladdened their hearts by seeing the property into the ould family again--as ould a one as any in ould Ireland. McElvina, like a wise man, held his tongue; and then they talked of their misfortunes--of the bad potato crop--of arrears of rent--one demand was heaped upon another, until McElvina was ultimately obliged to refer them all to the agent, whom he requested to be as lenient as possible. Emily was now reinstated in the castle where she had passed the first years of her existence, and found that all in it was new, except her old nurse, Norah. The contiguity of the McElvinas was a source of comfort to her, for she could not admire the dissipated companions of her father. Her life was solitary--but she had numerous resources within herself, and the winter passed rapidly away. In the spring, she returned to London with her father, who proudly introduced his daughter. Many were the solicitations of those who admired her person, or her purse. But in vain: her heart was pre-engaged; and it was with pleasure that she returned to Ireland, after the season was over, to renew her intimacy with the McElvinas, and to cherish, in her solitude, the remembrance of the handsome and high-minded William Seymour. CHAPTER FIFTY ONE.