“P. S. Martin is a little better; no immediate danger to life, but slight hopes of ultimate recovery. I was wrong as to the cause. It was a proclamation of outlawry against his son, the Captain, which he read in the 'Times.' Some implacable creditor or other had pushed his claim so far, as I believe is easy enough to do nowadays; and poor Martin, who connected this stigma with all the disgrace that once accompanied such a sentence, fell senseless to the ground, and was taken up palsied. He is perfectly collected and even tranquil now, and they wheeled me in to sit with him for an hour or so. Lady Dorothea behaves admirably; the first shock overwhelmed her, but that passed off, and she is now all that could be imagined of tenderness and zeal. “Kate I saw but for a second. She asked me to write to Captain Martin, and request him to hasten home. It was no time to trifle with her; so I simply promised to do so, adding,--“'_You,_ I trust, will not leave this at such a moment?' “'Assuredly not,' said she, slightly coloring at what implied my knowledge of her plans. “'Then all will go on well in that case,' said I. “'I never knew that I was reckoned what people call lucky,' said she, smiling. 'Indeed, most of those with whom I have been associated in life might say the opposite.' And then, without waiting to hear me, she left the room. “My brain is throbbing and my cheeks burning; some feverish access is upon me. So I send off this ere I grow worse. “Your faithful friend, “Jack Massingbred.” CHAPTER X. HOW ROGUES AGREE! Leaving the Martins in their quiet retreat at Spa, nor dwelling any longer on a life whose daily monotony was unbroken by an incident, we once more turn our glance westward. Were we assured that our kind readers' sympathies were with us, the change would be a pleasure to us, since it is there, in that wild mountain tract, that pathless region of fern and wild furze, that we love to linger, rambling half listlessly through silent glens and shady gorges, or sitting pensively on the storm-lashed shore, till sea and sky melt into one, and naught lowers through the gloom save the tall crags above us. We are once more back again at the little watering-place of Kilkieran, to which we introduced our readers in an early chapter of this narrative; but another change has come over that humble locality. The Osprey's Nest, the ornamented villa, on which her Ladyship had squandered so lavishly good money and bad taste, was now an inn! A vulgar sign-board, representing a small boat in a heavy sea, hung over the door, with the words “The Corragh” written underneath. The spacious saloon, whose bay-windows opened on the Atlantic, was now a coffee-room, and the small boudoir that adjoined it--desecration of desecrations--the bar!