e; but we cannot walk--the distance is too
great," replied Margaret.

"Well, we are near to the town of Lynton--it is not twenty minutes walk;
we will go to an hotel, and get a carriage. I--I can hardly endure this
suspense."

He never thought to ask her how she had come thither; it never occurred
to him. His whole soul was wrapped in the one idea--that he was to see
his child again--Madaline's child--the little babe he had held in his
arms, whose little face he had bedewed with tears--his own child--the
daughter he had lost for long years and had tried so hard to find. He
never noticed the summer woods through which he was passing; he never
heard the wild birds' song; of sunshine or shade he took no note. The
heart within him was on fire, for he was going to see his only
child--his lost child--the daughter whose voice he had never heard.

"Tell me," he said, stopping abruptly, and looking at Margaret "you saw
my poor wife when she lay dead--is my child like her?"

Margaret answered quickly.

"She is like her; but, to my mind, she is a thousand times fairer."

They reached the principal hotel at Lynton, and Lord Mountdean called
hastily for a carriage. Not a moment was to be lost--time pressed.

"You know the way," he said to Margaret, "will you direct the driver?"

He did not think to ask where his daughter lived, if she was married or
single, what she was doing or anything else; his one thought was that he
had found her--found her, never to lose her again.

He sat with his face shaded by his hand during the whole of the drive,
thanking Heaven that he had found Madaline's child. He never noticed the
woods, the high-road bordered with trees, the carriage-drive with its
avenue of chestnuts; he did not even recognize the picturesque, quaint
old Dower House that he had admired so greatly some little time before.
He saw a large mansion, but it never occurred to him to ask whether his
daughter was mistress or servant; he only knew that the carriage had
stopped, and that very shortly he should see his child.

Presently he found himself in a large hall gay with flowers and covered
with Indian matting, and Margaret Dornham was trembling before him.

"My lord," she said, "your daughter is ill, and I am afraid the
agitation may prove too much for her. Tell me, what shall I do?"

He collected his scattered thoughts.

"Do you mean to tell me," he asked, "that she has been kept In complete
ignorance of her history all