and loved. A suspicion
he had always entertained, that Cramier was not by breeding 'quite the
clean potato' may insensibly have influenced him just a little. He had
heard indeed that he was not even entitled to the name of Cramier, but
had been adopted by a childless man, who had brought him up and left him
a lot of money. There was something in this that went against the grain
of the childless Colonel. He had never adopted, nor been adopted by
anyone himself. There was a certain lack about a man who had been
adopted, of reasonable guarantee--he was like a non-vintage wine, or a
horse without a pedigree; you could not quite rely on what he might
do, having no tradition in his blood. His appearance, too, and
manner somehow lent colour to this distrust. A touch of the tar-brush
somewhere, and a stubborn, silent, pushing fellow. Why on earth had
Olive ever married him! But then women were such kittle cattle, poor
things! and old Lindsay, with his vestments and his views on obedience,
must have been a Tartar as a father, poor old chap! Besides, Cramier, no
doubt, was what most women would call good-looking; more taking to the
eye than such a quiet fellow as young Lennan, whose features were rather
anyhow, though pleasant enough, and with a nice smile--the sort of young
man one could not help liking, and who certainly would never hurt a
fly! And suddenly there came the thought: Why should he not go to young
Lennan and put it to him straight? That he was in love with Olive? Not
quite--but the way to do it would come to him. He brooded long over this
idea, and spoke of it to Mrs. Ercott, while shaving, the next morning.
Her answer: "My dear John, bosh!" removed his last doubt.

Without saying where he was going, he strolled out the moment after
breakfast--and took a train to Beaulieu. At the young man's hotel he
sent in his card, and was told that this Monsieur had already gone out
for the day. His mood of marching straight up to the guns thus checked,
he was left pensive and distraught. Not having seen Beaulieu (they spoke
of it then as a coming place), he made his way up an incline. That whole
hillside was covered with rose-trees. Thousands of these flowers were
starring the lower air, and the strewn petals of blown and fallen roses
covered the light soil. The Colonel put his nose to blossoms here and
there, but they had little scent, as if they knew that the season was
already over. A few blue-bloused peasants were still bus