“Geoff!” Lady Stanton was bewildered by this grand tone. She looked up at him with sudden curiosity, and this curiosity was mixed inevitably with some anxiety too; for, when your son betrays an unjustifiable partisanship, what so natural as to feel that he must have “some motive”? “Of course I did not mean to be unjust. But I do not pretend to remember everything that came out on the trial. It was the mother and daughter that interested me. You should ask your cousin Mary; she recollects better than I do. But have you heard anything about another? What did the poacher say? Had you a great deal of conversation with him? And don’t you think it was rash to put yourself in the power of such a lawless sort of fellow? Thank God! you are safe and sound.” “What do you mean about putting myself in his power? Do you think I am not a match for him? He is not such a giant, mother. Yes, I am quite safe and sound. And we had a great deal of talk. I never met with anybody so interesting. He talked about everything; chiefly about ‘the creatures,’ as he calls them.” “What creatures?” said Lady Stanton, wondering and alarmed. There were “creatures” in the world, this innocent lady knew, about whom a vagabond was very likely to talk, but who could not be mentioned between her and her boy. “The wild things in the woods, birds and mice, and such small deer, and all their ways, and what they mean, and how to make acquaintance with them. I don’t suppose he knows very much out of books,” said young Geoff; “but the bit of dark moor grew quite different with that wild fellow in it--like the hill in the _Lady of the Lake_, when all Clan Alpine got up from behind the rocks and the bushes. Don’t you remember, mother? One could hear ‘the creatures’ rustling and moving, and multitudes of living things one never gave a thought to. It felt like poetry, too, though I don’t know any poem like it. It was very strange and interesting. That pleases me more than your clever people,” said Geoff. “Oh, my dear, I beg your pardon,” said Lady Stanton, suddenly getting up and kissing her boy’s cheek as she passed him. She went away to hide the penitence in her eyes. As for Geoff, he took this very easily and simply. He thought it was natural she should apologize to Bampfylde for not thinking well of him. He had not a notion of the shame of evil-thinking thus brought home to her, which scorched Lady Stanton’s cheeks. CHAPTER XXIII. COUSIN MARY’S OPINION.