While all this was going on, young Lord Ravenel, the son and heir of Luxmore, had been a constant visitor at the Halifax home, and delighted in the company of John's daughter. Halifax had now three children: two boys, named Guy and Edmund, and Muriel, who, alas! had been born blind. Perhaps on account of her infirmity she had been the pet of her parents; but she was of a gentle nature, and was beautiful to look upon, even with her sightless eyes. The time for the election of the member for Kingswell had come round, and as Luxmore had failed to induce John Halifax to stand, he put up a pliable nominee. But he was greatly mistaken in supposing that John would use his influence to make the handful of voters, most of whom were employed in his mills, vote for Luxmore's man. Instead of that, Halifax advised them to be honest, and vote as they thought right; with the result that Luxmore promptly evicted them from their homes. But John found new homes for them. As his riches increased, he bought a stately country mansion, named Beechwood, not far from Rose Cottage, ever dear in memory to him. Another son, Walter, was born there, and everything seemed to smile on him in his beautiful country home. Luxmore now sought to injure him by diverting the water from his cloth-mills, and leaving his great wheels idle. Halifax could have taken him to law; but, instead of that, he set up a strange, new-fangled thing, called a steam-engine; and his mills did better than ever. Finding it useless to fight against the resourceful Halifax, Luxmore went abroad, and left his son, Lord Ravenel, alone at Luxmore Hall. The young man, despite his father's unfriendly conduct, was still a frequent visitor at Beechwood, and when poor Muriel died, his grief at her loss was only less than that of her parents. The years passed by, and happiness still reigned at Beechwood; but Ravenel had deserted them, until one day John Halifax met him, greatly changed from the gentle youth of the past, at Norton Bury. John invited him to ride over with him to Enderley. "Enderly? How strange the word sounds! Yet I should like to see the place again," said Ravenel, who decided to accompany John Halifax and Phineas Fletcher in their drive back to Beechwood. He inquired kindly for all the family, and was told that Guy and Walter were as tall as himself, while the daughter---- "Your daughter?" said his lordship, with a start. "Oh, yes; I recollect--Baby Maud! Is she at all like--like----" "No," said John Halifax. Neither said more than this; but it seemed as if their hearts warmed to one another, knitted by the same tender remembrance. _IV.--The Journey's End_ Lord Ravenel had returned to reside again at Luxmore Hall, and his visits to Beechwood became as regular as they had been in the old days at the Halifax home, when Muriel was alive. It was the society of Maud in which his lordship now delighted, though he never forgot the serene and happy days he had spent with her blind sister.