"Yes; as if some secret preyed upon him. I have watched him closely from time to time, for the last few years, and such, my dear sir, is my firm conviction." "Your idea seems to me incomprehensible, doctor." "There is a skeleton in every house," said the other with a simper. "Sir, you forget yourself," exclaimed Roland, with haughty surprise. "What skeleton could be in ours?" "Pardon me--I used but a proverb. Your father is awake now," he added, as a distant bell rang. And Roland, considerably agitated and ruffled by what had passed, repaired at once to the sick chamber. CHAPTER II. THE FATAL DAY OF THE RUTHVENS. The affectionate and filial heart of Roland was wrung by the wan and haggard aspect of his father, who looked as grim and pale as that other Patrick Ruthven, whose ghastly visage in his helmet had so appalled the luckless Mary on the night that Rizzio was slain; but the old man's eyes brightened, his colour came back for a time, and his strength even seemed to rally as his son embraced him. "You have lost no time in attending my summons, Roland," said he, retaining the latter's hand within his own. "I left Montreal by the first steamer, my dear father, but I got away with difficulty." "Why?" "A revolt among the colonists is daily expected; but when I mentioned your illness, the Colonel at once obtained leave for me from the General at Halifax." "Dear old Geordie Wetherall! I remember him a sub in his first red coat, when we were ensigns together, in the "rookery," as we called it, in Edinburgh Castle. Ah, few of the Royals of that day are surviving now. They have nearly all gone before me to the Land o' the Leal! But in fancy I can see them all yet." Then, though ailing nigh unto death, true to his old instincts, almost the first questions he asked of Roland were about their old regiment, its strength and appearance, of the officers and rank and file; and then he sighed again, to think that none remembered him save old Geordie Wetherall, a veteran of the conquest of Java; and all these questions Roland had to answer, ere he could lure his father to speak of himself, and when the latter did so, his spirit fell, his colour faded, and the momentary lustre died out of his eyes, though the glassy glare of illness still remained. "I hope the alleged danger of this mysterious illness is exaggerated," said Roland, tenderly and anxiously; "and that ere I return to the regiment, I shall see you well and strong--ay, perhaps taking your fences as of old with Bob Buckle at your back." The old Laird of Ardgowrie smiled sadly, and turned restlessly on his pillow--and a handsome man he was, even in age, with a wonderful likeness to his son, having the same straight nose and mouth clean cut and chiselled, "the prerogative of the highly born," as Lever has it--for Patrick Ruthven belonged to the untitled noblesse of Scotland, the lineage of some of whom stretches far back into the shadowy past.