Such was the perilous inmate which a mistaken sense of kindness, gratitude, and hospitality had induced Lord Aberfeldie to make one of the family circle at Dundargue during the shooting season; and to whom the advent of the bangle--which, though it slipped easily upon his wrist, most mysteriously would not come off it--and other adventitious circumstances, the real cause of which he did not know, gave a considerable amount of what he termed to himself 'modest assurance' and confidence of ultimate success. 'I should like to come into a nice little pot of money--a fortune, if you will--but not with a girl tacked to it,' he said, on one occasion, to throw Allan 'off the scent,' as he thought. 'I am neither domestic nor ambitious. A few thousands would do.' 'And make you content?' 'Content! I should feel as happy as more than once I have been at Monaco, when I have seen the croupier's rake pushing a jolly pile of gold across the _trente-et-quarante_ table towards me, by Jove.' It did not occur to him that by little speeches like this and anecdotes about his own acumen in the betting ring, he let a little light in upon the general tenor of his past and present life, and, all unconscious that Sir Paget and others listened with slightly elevated eyebrows, he would produce a sealskin cigar-case of portentous dimensions, draw therefrom a great Rio Hondo cigar, and after carefully manipulating it, begin to smoke it with intense satisfaction. Hawke Holcroft, like Mr. Micawber, was always waiting for something to 'turn up' in the way of good for himself, and now thought he had found that something in Olive Raymond--an heiress free, he deemed, to choose for herself--free to be wooed and won; and on a day when she proposed a riding-party to visit Macbeth's Castle of Dunsinane he very nearly had the hardihood to learn his fate--in the words of Montrose's song, to put it 'to the touch, to win or lose it all.' Drives, riding-parties, and rambles to visit artistic bits of scenery and the rural [** Transcriber's note: line missing from source book?] lions the neighbourhood afforded every opportunity to those who wished to cultivate each other's society at Dundargue, and the expedition proposed by Olive to visit the ruins of the usurper's castle, proved the occasion of Mr. Hawke Holcroft's attempt to advance his own interests. Whatever Lady Aberfeldie's views were, her husband had never been called upon to fulfil the duties of a vigilant guardian or parent, and to study the difference between 'detrimentals' and married parties, so he left the guidance of the whole affair in the hands of Allan, and remained closeted with his solicitor. By judicious manoeuvring, Holcroft contrived to pair-off with Olive, while Allan thus became the escort of Ruby Logan, and Eveline, of course, fell to Sir Paget, who soon found the truth of the vulgar adage about two being company, &c., on their being joined by Stratherroch.