Robin was paying very little attention. He was looking worried, and Clare watched him a little anxiously. "I hope you will be able to stay with us some days, Mr. Randal," she said. "There are several new people in Pendragon whom I should like you to meet." Randal was charmed. He would love to stop, but he must get back to London almost immediately. He was going over to Germany next week and there were many arrangements to be made. "Germany!" It was Robin who spoke, but the voice was not his usual one. It was alive, vibrating, startling. "Germany! By Jove! Randal--are you really going?" "Why, of course," a little wearily; "I have been before, you know. Rather a bore, but the Rainers--you remember them, Miss Trojan--are going over to the Beethoven Festival at Bonn and are keen on my going with them. I wasn't especially anxious, but one must do these things, you know." "Robin was there a year ago--Germany, I mean--and loved it. Didn't you, Robin?" "Germany? It was Paradise, Heaven--what you will. Ruegen, the Harz, Heidelberg, Worms----" He stopped and his voice broke. "I'm a little absurd about it still," he said, as though in apology for such unnecessary enthusiasm. "Oh! you're young, Robin," said Randal, laughing. "When you've seen as much as I have you'll be blase. Not that one ought to be, but Germany--well, it hardly lasts, I think. Ruegen--why, it rained and there were mists round the Studenkammer, and how those people eat at the Jagdschloss! Heidelberg! picture postcards and shocking hotels--Oh! No, Robin, you'll see all that later. I wish you were going instead of me, though." Harry had looked up at the sound of Robin's voice. It had been a new note. There had been an eagerness, an enthusiasm, that meant life and something genuine. Hope that had been slowly dying revived again. If Robin really cared for Germany like that, then they had something in common. With that spark a fire might be kindled. A red-gold haze as of fire burnt in the night sky, over the town. Stars danced overhead, a little wind, beating fitfully at the window, seemed to carry the light of the moon in its tempestuous track, blowing it lightly in silver mists and clouds over the moor. The Wise Men were there, strong and dark and sombre, watching over the lighted town and listening patiently to the ripple and murmur and life of the sea at their feet. In the little inn at the Cove men were sitting over the roaring fire, telling tales--strange, weird stories of a life that these others did not know. Harry had heard them when he was a boy--those stories--and he had felt the spell and the magic. There had been life in them and romance.