"Good-night, Falconer!" he said. "Thank you--for my boy's sake!"

Falconer took the warm hand in his cold one and held it for a moment,
then dropped it.

"Good-night!" he said, with a nod and a sidelong glance.

Sir Stephen went back and poured himself out another _liqueur_ glass of
brandy and heaved a sigh of relief. But it would have been one of
apprehension if he could have seen the cruel smile which distorted
Falconer's face as he went through the exquisitely beautiful hall and
corridors to the luxurious room which had been allotted to him.

There was in the smile and the cold glitter of the eyes the kind of
look which the cat wears when it plays with a mouse.

CHAPTER XII.

Ida walked home through the rain very thoughtfully: but not sadly; for
though it was still pelting in the uncompromising lake fashion, she was
half conscious of a strange lightness of the heart, a strange
brightness in herself, and even in the rain-swept view, which vaguely
surprised and puzzled her. The feeling was not vivid enough to be
happiness, but it was the nearest thing to it.

And without realising it, she thought, all the way home, of Stafford
Orme. Her life had been so secluded, so solitary and friendless, that
he had come into it as a sudden and unexpected flash of sunlight in a
drear November day. It seemed to her extraordinary that she should have
met him so often, still more extraordinary the offer he had made that
morning. She asked herself, as she went with quick, light step along
the hills, why he had done it; why he, who was rich and had so many
friends--no doubt the Villa would be full of them--should find any
pleasure in learning to herd cattle and count sheep, to ride about the
dale with only a young girl for company.

If anyone had whispered, "It is because he prefers that young girl's
society to any other's; it is because he wants to be with you, not from
any desire to learn farming," she would have been more than surprised,
would have received this offer of a solution of the mystery with a
smile of incredulity; for there had been no candid friend to tell her
that she possessed the fatal gift of beauty; that she was one of those
upon whom the eyes of man cannot look without a stirring of the heart,
and a quickening of the pulse. Vanity is a strong plant, and it
flourishes in every soil; but it had found no root in Ida's nature. She
was too absorbed in the round of her daily tasks, in the care of her
fathe