They had many such drives after this, exploring the country for twenty miles round Fortinbras. They held impromptu picnics on breezy heights above the level of the sea; picnics in which the rector of Fortinbras and his two pretty daughters were sometimes invited to join, and which ended with tea-drinking at Sea-View Villa, and croquet on the lawn; and then they had lonely drives to distant villages, where there were old Norman churches to be explored, under convoy of quavery old sextons, who always had to be fetched from their dinner or their tea; dusky old churches which Mrs. MacClaverhouse declined to enter, and in whose solemn gloom Hector and Cecil dawdled together, discussing the dates of doors and windows, tombs and font, stalls and reading-desk, while the old sexton hovered respectfully in attendance, and while the dowager dozed delightfully in her carriage, lulled by the booming of excited bees. Sometimes Mrs. MacClaverhouse was too lazy to go out at all, and on those occasions the shabby fly and the shabby horses enjoyed a holiday, while Hector and Cecil strolled on the sands before the villa, or dawdled on the lawn. They were very happy together. All Lady Cecil's proud reserve melted under the influence of the Scotchman's genial nature. It was simply impossible not to like him; it was very difficult to resist his fascination, the indescribable witchery that lurked in his manner when he wished to please. Lord Aspendell's daughter found herself forgetting how slight a link bound her to this pleasant companion, and admitting him to a cousinly intimacy before she had time to think of what she was doing; and then it was such an easy brotherly and sisterly friendship, that to draw back from it would have seemed prudish and ungracious; so Cecil walked and talked with the young Captain, and read and played to him in the evenings, and enjoyed to the full that delightful association which can only arise between two well-bred and highly educated people. If either of them had been ignorant or shallow, selfish or vain, such close companionship must have become intolerable at the end of a week. Every body knows how weary Madame du Doffand and President Heinault grew of themselves and existence in less than twelve hours, when they met in a friend's deserted apartment, in order to escape from their visitors for the enjoyment of each other's society; but then Madame and the President were middle-aged lovers, and the freshness of youth was wanting to transform the place of their rendezvous into a paradise.