according to the old ideas?"

"Ay, I follow," said the Scotsman. "No kirk, no minister, no witnesses,
no anything?"

"Yes," said Paul. "Would they be married?"

"Ay, they would. But if one of them tried to back out, ye see,
difficulties come in. In that case they would have to declare themselves
before someone that they were married."

"Well, then," continued Paul, "suppose they went to an inn that night and
the man called the woman his wife before the innkeeper and his wife?"

"Ah, then you have got something to go on," said the lawyer. "That
certainly would clinch the nail. Ye're thinking of property, I expect?"

"There's another question I want to ask," said Paul, not noticing the
query which the old Scotsman had interposed. "Supposing that directly
they were married in Scotland they went to England, and the inn wherein
the man called the woman his wife was in England. Would that make any
difference?"

The old Scotsman scratched his head. "Ay, man," he said, "it might. But
I'm no sure."

"Not even if both the man and the woman signed their names in a book that
they were married?"

"I'm no sure," repeated the lawyer. "But I could find out for you, say,
for a matter of five pounds, and I would let you know. But I would have
to write to Edinburgh and, it may be, have to consult many documents."

Paul could not get beyond this, and when, at the end of three days, he
returned to England, he felt that, although his visit to his mother's
home and the scenes associated with their marriage were extremely
interesting, he had made no real forward step. One statement of the old
lawyer, however, remained in his memory, and he brooded over it during
his journey back to Brunford: "If ye could find the man," said the old
lawyer, "who took the lass to the inn on the English side of the border
and declared her to be his wife and signed his name in the book, I think
you would have such a hold on him, if ye faced him with these things,
that he couldna get out of it. But beyond this I daurna go."

And so Paul felt he had moved forward in spite of himself. Somehow the
marriage seemed more real, and he felt that he was nearer the day when
the shame which had so long rested upon his mother's life would be lifted.

No sooner had he reached Brunford, however, than these thoughts were
driven from his mind. Rumours were in the air that the Government was
about to resign and that an election was imminent.

"Bolith