Guy believed that his soul was saved. There are no other words for it, though these may convey a hundred other meanings. But there was "more to come." Whether this conviction was well-founded, or whether, as Cuthbert would have told him, it sprang from the depression of exhausted nerves and spirits; from the melancholy too often associated with trials such as his, it equally proved that he was not free as other men were for the sweetness of life and love. As other men? Were other men free? "The drink" might have been a bugbear to him, but it was an awful fact to thousands of those others. How many devils had possessed his rough ancestors, whose clutch had not closed on him, because the one great gain of old Margaret's courage had been that he and his brother began life on a higher level? How did this poor Jem Outhwaite, who burlesqued and caricatured his own grim experiences, come to be what he was? As this thought occurred to him, Jem himself started out of a gateway beside him, and, after a grin and nod of greeting, picked up Rawdie, and carried him over a muddy piece of ground, through which he himself humbly shambled beside Guy's horse. The royal favourite should not needlessly wet his feet. Jem was a conversational person, and fired off short remarks at intervals. "Owd Cowperthwaite says Waynfletes'll tak' t' bread out o's mouth." "Old Cowperthwaite's a scoundrel," said Guy. "Ay, sir," said Jem, cheerfully. Then, after a pause, "I see twa rabbits over Flete Edge. Mr Godfrey can shoot 'em." "Ay, I dare say he will." "I see t' owd gen'leman by t' brig on Friday," said Jem, in the same contented treble. "Nay, Jem, I don't think you did," said Guy, didactically. "I see Miss Flowra," said Jem, in the same tone of cheerful indifference. Guy sprang from his horse, and Jem, setting Rawdie delicately down on a bit of turf, grinned, nodded, shambled away across a field towards the river, and was out of sight in a minute. "Oh," said Florella, as she came up, "I hope Jem will go straight home, he has been about all day. Old Peggy is really ill. She got a chill the other day waiting for him at the bridge in the rain. You know he stops at the Dragon, and the doctor says he must be found quick, or it may go hard with her." "I know," said Guy, briefly. "I'll just go and put my horse up, and then go and fetch him. He'll come with me. He was here this minute." "You know," said Florella, in a half-whisper, "that he says t' owd Guy stops him." "I know," said Guy. "But don't listen to stories about him. _You_ mustn't get to fancy the place is haunted." "I am not afraid," she said, and there was a touch of reproach in her voice. Guy paused a moment, then spoke in another tone.