_Alas, how easily things go wrong!_ _A sigh too much, or a kiss too long,_ _And there follows a mist and a weeping rain,_ _And life is never the same again._ ‘Farewell, dear Joan--till to-morrow!’ ‘Till to-morrow, dear Brion!’ It sounded in his ears like an empty echo. CHAPTER XIII. DESOLATION O, the mist and the weeping rain! They were there in good earnest when Brion opened his eyes the next morning to a disenchanted world. In the night great sea fogs had trooped in from the south-west, and sponged out the landscape as a fresco might be blotted from a wall, leaving only faint indications here and there of the original design. It was drearily ominous of change, of the effacing of halcyon days, and of the blankness which follows Youth’s first realisation that it is not immune from the common heritage of loss and sorrow. Sad is loneliness, but sadder still the loneliness which bright company has found and forsaken. There was a time before the boy which, in moods and spasms, he was to feel almost unendurable. He did not, of course, wake at once to any desolate conviction of an end; but, while something faintly premonitory of it whispered in his heart, rose and went about his business, pretending to himself a confidence he did not really feel. Hope was not dead because the weather was bad. He had a tryst to keep, and keep it he would, though the heavens fell. Yet he did not keep it--and for the sufficient reason that he could not. He had had no experience so far of a Dartmoor mist, nor guessed the nature of its baffling density. A very little venturing, however, was enough to convince him that he had no more chance of winning to the bower in that sodden blinding cloud than he had of finding his mistress, unless by some miracle, awaiting him there. And to that conclusion Phineas, who had discovered him on the point of issuing forth, helped him. ‘Whither away, an it please you?’ said he, his brows lifted. ‘To the moors,’ answered Brion. ‘And to your death on them, mayhap,’ said the cook. ‘Dost know what thou venturest? Be warned, young master.’ ‘What death?’ said the boy scornfully. ‘The death of rocks and water, of falls and blind wanderings, of cold and exhaustion. Thou must not go, indeed.’ ‘Must not, master cook! That is no word for me. Now, stand aside, I prithee.’ ‘What shall I say to his honour, when he comes to call my account?’ ‘Say that you did your best, but could not prevail with a proud and wilful boy. I prithee, good Phineas.’ ‘Now, God help both me and you! Will you do it?’ Brion pushed by, with no answer other than a laugh, and ran out into the mist. He found, with some difficulty, the wicket in the big outer gate, opened it, stepped through, and passed over the bridge. And the fog swallowed him. An hour later he came back. Phineas heard and ran out, to find him sitting, white and dripping, in the hall. He threw up his arms, with a great sigh of joy and relief:-- ‘_Gratias agamus Domino Deo nostro!_’