"He will stay with my Aunt Fanny in London--she is my father's sister, you know--or he may go abroad with father for a month or two." And she sighed unconsciously. For a while they walked on in silence. They had left the hot yellow path for the green turf. In front of them was a belt of trees, with chairs dotted about in the shadow. Ralph felt as though he were in dreamland. It seemed scarcely credible that he should be walking and talking with the daughter of Sir John Hamblyn. Dorothy broke the silence at length, and her words came with manifest effort. "I hope my father expressed his regret, and apologised for the mistake he made?" "Oh, as to that," he said, with a short laugh, "I am afraid I have given him no opportunity. You see, I have been very much occupied, and then I don't live in St. Goram now." "And--and--your people?" "You know, I suppose, that my mother is dead?" "No; I had not heard. Oh, I am so sorry!" "She died the day after I came back from prison." "Oh, how sad!" "I don't think she thought so. She was glad to welcome me back again, of course, and to know that my innocence had been established. But since father died she seemed to have nothing to live for." Then silence fell again for several minutes. They had reached the shadow of the trees, and Dorothy suggested that they should sit down and rest a while. Ralph pulled up a chair nearly opposite her. He still felt like one in a dream. Every now and then he raised his eyes to her face, and thought how beautiful she had grown. "Do you know," she said, breaking the silence again, "I was almost afraid to speak to you just now." "Afraid?" "You have suffered a good deal at our hands." "Well?" His heart was in a tumult, but he kept himself well in hand. "It must require a good deal of grace to keep you from hating us most intensely." "I am afraid I am not as good a hater as I would like to be." "As you would like to be?" "It has not been for want of trying, I can assure you. But Fate loves to make fools of us." "I don't think I quite understand," she said, looking puzzled. "Do you want to understand?" he questioned, speaking slowly and steadily, though every drop of blood in his veins seemed to be at boiling point. "Yes, very much," she answered, making a hole in the ground with her sunshade. "Then you shall know," he said, with his eyes on some distant object. He had grown quite reckless. He feared nothing, cared for nothing. It would be a huge joke to tell this proud daughter of the house of Hamblyn the honest truth. Moreover, it might help him to defy the Fate that was mocking him, might help to relieve the tension of the last few days, and would certainly put an end to the possibility of her ever speaking to him again.