aid
Heathcote. "You don't want him to lose a post?"

"And the gray horse?"

"He's mine; I 've bought him."

"I suppose you 've no objection to my taking a canter on him this
morning?"

"Ride him, by all means," said Agincourt, shaking his hand cordially
while he said adieu.

"Why did you ask him to dinner to-day?" said Heathcote, peevishly. "I
wanted you to have come over and dined with us. My father is eager to
see you, and so is May."

"Let us go to tea, then. And how are they?--how is he looking?"

"Broken,--greatly broken. I was shocked beyond measure to see him so
much aged since we met, and his spirits gone,--utterly gone."

"Whence is all this?"

"He says that I deserted him,--that he was forsaken."

"And is he altogether wrong, Charley? Does not conscience prick you on
that score?"

"He says, too, that I have treated May as cruelly and as unjustly;
also, that I have broken up their once happy home. In fact, he lays all
at _my_ door."

"And have you seen _her?_"

"Yes, we had a meeting last night, and a long talk this morning; and,
indeed, it was about that I wanted to speak to you when I found O'Shea
here. Confound the fellow! he has made the thing more difficult than
ever, for I have quite forgotten how I had planned it all."

"Planned it all! Surely there was no need of a plan, Charley, in
anything that you meant to say to _me?_"

"Yes, but there was, though. You have very often piqued me by saying
that I never knew my own mind from one day to another, that you were
always prepared for some change of intention in me, and that nothing
would surprise you less than that I should 'throw you over' the very day
before we were to sail for India."

"Was I very, very unjust, Charley?" said he, kindly.

"_I_ think you were, and for this reason: he who is master of his own
fate, so far as personal freedom and ample fortune can make him, ought
not to judge rashly of the doubts and vacillations and ever changing
purposes of him who has to weigh fifty conflicting influences. The one
sufficiently strong to sway others may easily take his line and follow
it; the other is the slave of any incident of the hour, and must be
content to accept events, and not mould them."

"I read it all, Charley. You 'll not go out?"

"I will not."

Agincourt repressed the smile that was fast gathering on his lips, and,
in a grave and quiet voice, said, "And why?"

"For the very reason you have so often given me. She