ter the others, evidently with a view of performing for
them the same office Elsmere had just performed for Catherine.

Robert and his companion struggled on for a while in a breathless
silence against the deluge, which seemed to beat on them from all sides.
He walked behind her, sheltering her by his tall form, and his big
umbrella, as much as he could. His pulses were all aglow with the joy of
the storm. It seemed to him that he rejoiced with the thirsty grass
over which the rain-streams were running, that his heart filled with the
shrunken becks as the flood leapt along them. Let the elements thunder
and rave as they pleased. Could he not at a word bring the light of that
face, those eyes, upon him? Was she not his for a moment in the rain and
the solitude, as she had never been in the commonplace sunshine of their
valley life?

Suddenly he heard an exclamation and saw her run on in front of him.
What was the matter? Then he noticed for the first time that Rose far
ahead was still walking in her cotton dress. The little scatterbrain
had, of course, forgotten her cloak. But, monstrous! There was
Catherine stripping off her own, Rose refusing it. In vain. The sister's
determined arms put it round her. Rose is enwrapped, buttoned up before
she knows where she is, and Catherine falls back, pursued by same shaft
from Rose, more sarcastic than grateful to judge by the tone of it.

'Miss Leyburn, what have you been doing?'

'Rose had forgotten her cloak,' she said, briefly; 'she has a very thin
dress on, and she is the only one of us that takes cold easily.'

'You must take my mackintosh,' he said at once.

She laughed in his face.

'As if I should do anything of the sort!'

'You must,' he said, quietly stripping it off. 'Do you think that you
are always to be allowed to go through the world taking thought of other
people and allowing no one to take thought of you?'

He held it out to her.

'No, no! This is absurd, Mr. Elsmere. You are not strong yet. And I have
often told you that nothing hurts me.'

He hung it deliberately over his arm. 'Very well, then, there it stays!'

And they hurried on again, she biting her lip and on the point of
laughter.

'Mr. Elsmere, be sensible!' she said presently, her look changing to
one of real distress. 'I should never forgive myself if you got a chill
after your illness!'

'You will not be called upon,' he said, in the most matter-of-fact tone.
'Men's coats are made to k